


holy spaces: or the rise and fall of voltron's rock n' roll

by NovaScotty



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: 1970s, Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Although none of the characters participate in it, Angst with a Happy Ending, Band Break Up, Cheating, Emotional Infidelity, Emotional Sex, Hate Sex, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Inspired by a Fleetwood Mac Album, Internalized Biphobia, M/M, Oblivious Keith (Voltron), Period-Typical Homophobia, Pining Keith (Voltron), Pining Lance (Voltron), References to songs I like from that era, Semi-Historically Accurate 70s LA Music Scene, Songwriting as a bonding experience, They don't cheat on each other though, Underage Drinking, because why not lol
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-29
Updated: 2020-11-30
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:55:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 21,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24302506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NovaScotty/pseuds/NovaScotty
Summary: "...Voltron was one of the greatest and most influential bands to come out of the ’70s. The band, playing since they were seniors in high school, weren’t all they were cut out to be. Vocalist Allura was rumored to have been in an unstable relationship with vocalist Lance McClain that went on for years until he admitted to cheating on her in his memoir Clean .As if that weren’t enough, there were also the legendary feuds between McClain and fellow bandmate Keith Kogane. Throughout their career the two would go through periods of turmoil which were chronicled in the band’s music and lyrics, producing some of the most innovative records of the decade.However, it was the alleged love triangle between female vocalist Allura and her bandmates McClain and Kogane that ended up being the band's demise in ‘76. Following the band’s 1976 Listeners tour in which Kogane famously left the band after their final show..."In the many years after the break-up, Lance McClain asked Keith Kogane this question: "Back then...were we in love?"Keith thinks they were, but what use would it be to say that now. Instead, he says only this, "I don't know."Or the 70s Band AU no one asked for.
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 11
Kudos: 44





	1. prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A special thanks to my friend dreamformetoo for betaing this for me!

> “ **Voltron** was an American-British rock band formed in 1970 in Altea, New Mexico. The group consisted of Kieth Kogane (songwriter, guitar and keyboard), Lance McClain (guitar and vocals), Hunk Garrett (bass), Katie ‘Pidge’ Holt (drums and backup-vocals) and Allura (vocals and tambourine). Voltron rose to prominence in 1973, after the release of their single ‘Underneath You’, Their critically acclaimed albums _Form Voltron!_ and _Negative Space_ drew attention from a large variety of media outlets in the United States and the United Kingdom, with the single ‘Blue Hearts Caught Red Handed’ becoming their signature song. The band recorded one more album, _Listeners_ in 1975 and dissolved in 1977 after a lengthy hiatus from touring or recording.”

—excerpt from Wikipedia.com entry for ‘Voltron’.

♪

If, years and years later, you looked up the Wikipedia page for **Voltron** (band) it would probably say something along the lines of “ _Voltron was an American rock band formed in 1970 in Altea, New Mexico ..._ ” But—if you asked the members themselves we’re sure they would all answer a different set of events, different accounts unique to their own experience within the entity that is Voltron. This is the one Keith Kogane counts as true:

**1969**

Keith entered his senior year of high school the summer before Shiro made it home from Vietnam. In the first week he noticed a tall gangly kid stalking him. And. He was staring. _Again_. Keith wasn’t too used to being stared at. It confused him. He was more used to being the loner type; the observer type; the wallflower type. Being the subject of someone’s interest was a completely new experience for him.

Not that the boy was _interested_. Not like that at least. Keith was pretty sure he was the only queer in the entire school. He would be sure he was the only one in the whole of Altea if he hadn’t met Shiro and Adam.

No, the boy was not interested—judging from the time he had accidentally run into him kissing down a girls neck behind the bleachers Keith was convinced the boy had no interest of that kind in him—and _yet_ , even though they had never talked, there were a times when Keith had been sure the boy had intended to strike up conversation.

Like the time Keith had been crossing the school lawn, his guitar slung over his shoulder, and the boy’s head turned a full one-eighty degrees as he watched him walk by, jaw dropped. Or the time he borrowed Shiro’s Harley so he could take the motorcycle driving test and the boy stumbled in his step as he watched Keith smoothly park the Harley into the school parking lot.

The first time, Keith had been carrying his guitar so of course he had come to the only conclusion possible: The boy had somehow, somewhere, seen him play—and was, Keith hoped, interested in playing together. It wouldn’t be a weird assumption to make; Keith played at every talent show since middle school.

The boy was currently across the hall next to his locker, sneaking peeks his way every time he thought Keith wasn’t looking. Keith had had enough of the staring. He picked his bag from where it lay next to his Doc Marten’d feet. (Keith had saved for them for weeks after seeing the a candid where the vocalist from the Who donned a pair.)

Keith blinked, feeling silly as he walked across the hall full of mid-period students going to their next classes. Suddenly he was in front of the boy. “Hey,” Keith said, wondering how his feet had taken him there. “Do you have some kind of problem?” Keith didn’t mean to sound so confrontational and flinched when the boy’s blue eyes widened, and his face—usually a rich medium brown—blanched.

He said, “Keith.”

Keith blinked.

The boy raised one perfect eyebrow. “You don’t remember my name do you?”

Keith didn’t but he tried not to get sidetracked, “Uh. Sorry, I came over ‘cause I noticed you were staring at my guitar—and I thought you might wanna play together sometime? I know you play classical guitar with the orchestra—”

Keith got sidetracked. By the burning blue of the boy’s eyes as he glared at Keith. He edged back. _Did I do something wrong?_ Keith wondered.

The boy was speaking now. Keith rubbed the second knuckle of his index finger to calm his nervous energy. He noticed the boy’s eyes of deep sapphire blue, stubby eyelashes fluttering, his large hands with long fingers, his wrist bent delicately as he gestured, and there was way his cheeks rouged naturally—Keith forced himself to focus and tune into what the boy was saying.

“—ever play with you. We’re rivals! !” The boy leaned against his locker—hands in pockets—and grinned perfect white teeth at him. “And for the record I am way more good looking than you and your greasy mullet.” This last part was said with the vitriol of the very young and very envious, but Keith didn’t notice that. Didn’t notice the envy the other boy held for him. (We believe neither of them noticed the other feelings swelling between them.)

Keith didn’t—couldn’t—come up with what to say to that. The caveman part of his brain was still stuck on the pretty line of the boy’s neck as he struck such a silly pose. The queer part was panicking too, _Can he tell I’m attracted to him? Why does he hate me?_ Keith thought as his heartbeat rose. Because that’s what it had been, Keith realized. All this time the boy had been looking at him with animosity.

“Whuh—huh?” Keith said smartly.

The boy leaned in, so close Keith could smell his cologne. Keith did not inhale.

“It’s okay. I have that effect on everyone.” The boy glared at him and for a second Keith thought he glanced down at his lips.

“Uh—”

“Lance.”

“Huh?”

“The name,” the boy said, “is Lance.”

Keith stared at Lance in what he hoped was blank openness. Lance stared back as if waiting for Keith to show some spark of recognition.

“From Art…?” Lance trailed off, eyes going dim.

Keith blushed. Keith would be lying if he said he remembered Lance from the one semester he had been in Art back in sophomore year.

“Right. Uh…Keith,” Keith introduced himself solemnly and outstretched his hand.

Lance’s grin faltered only slightly but he quickly composed himself and extended long, brown fingers for him to shake. Keith took his hand, felt the way their palms faced each other, sinew and bone and skin.

“So. What can I do for you Keith .” Lance said this almost with reluctance, like it pained him to be even remotely civil towards Keith.

Despite himself Keith thought something along the lines of, _Join my band and play music with me because I saw you at the orchestra recital and I think I would have fallen in love with just the way you play guitar, but you’re eyes are so blue I feel like I’m going to expose myself just for the risk of touching your hand_ —

What he said was, “Are you interested in joining my band?”

The boy—Lance—blinked as if he was taken aback by Keith’s answer; as if he had been hoping to hear something else.

“Oh.” A softer, more genuine grin crossed his face. His eyes crinkled sweetly at the edges. “ _Oh._ ”

Keith, realizing he still had Lance’s hand in his, let go of as if shocked, crossed his arms in self-defense, grunted.

“Well, are you interested in learning some new stuff?”

“What?”

“It’s just—I’ve seen you staring at my Fender.” Keith thought he heard Lance mutter something under his breath but didn't catch what. “Pardon?”

Lance bristled and straightened. “I said, yeah—yes!”

Keith uncrossed his arms, fished inside his pockets for the spare piece of paper where he scribbled an address while in his trig class—the class when he decided to do _this_. Form a band. (Or at least, try.)

Keith was a man of impulse, as such: He shoved the paper at the boy's chest, released the slip without waiting for him to catch it in those long brown fingers. Said, “Well, if you want to play anything from this century, be there. Next week.” And walked silently away.

This, of course, was how Keith Kogane remembered things going. He thinks, even now, that it would be hard to forget the feeling of Lance’s callouses as they brushed against the inside of his wrist. He was a goner, even then, he thinks.

♪

> “ **Lance McClain:** ‘There’s a dispute over how the band formed. Keith says he asked me to join in the hallway outside of the cafeteria when we were in high school. Now he’s not wrong, he did ask while we were in school, but he didn’t ask me in the hallways. If he says he didn’t ambush me in the bathrooms, the urinals no less—’
> 
> **Keith Kogane:** ‘ Lies. Slander!’
> 
> **Lance McClain:** ‘I am not joking when I say, this man—’ [ _McClain wraps an arm around Kogane’s shoulders and points at him_.] ‘—is a mess of a man and deserves no one’s admiration…’[ _McClain throws his head back in laughter_. _Kogane remains silent._ ]”

—Interview with Vanity Fair, October 1974.

♪

Lance spent all of freshman year trying his best to make friends with someone to play music with. He had seen Hunk Garrett running around the hallways with his cello. And that nerdy kid who went by Pidge was the president of the AV club. And of course, there was also Kogane who would walk around campus with that beautifully undeserved cherry wood Fender slung across his back.

Now it’s worth mentioning that Lance had a crush on Jenny Shaybon. He spent all of junior year following her around like a lost little puppy. But, oddly, whenever he wasn’t looking that way his eyes were caught on another creature just as terrifying: Keith Kogane. Lance had been strangely fixated on Kogane ever since he had seen him carrying a battered guitar case around the hallways in their freshman year. (Lance wanted desperately to be his friend.)

He wore leather gloves and carried with him a look of scorn like the world itself had wronged him. It excited Lance, the thought of having a friend like that. He spent his classes daydreaming about what music the boy might like, what jokes might coax out a smile—and he thought nothing of the fact that he spent more time devoted to trying to guess Keith’s favorite Beatle than he spent thinking of Jenny Shaybon total.

Despite having shared many classes with Kogane, Lance could not find a way to approach him. He had tried making a comment in their shared Algebra class when they were freshmen (“I see you have a Fender. I myself have been saving up for one. Maybe we could get together to play some—”) only to be interrupted when Mrs S called him up front to pick up his exam as the bell rang, and when he returned to pick up where he had left off, Kogane was gone.

And Lance was still alone.

Until the second month into his senior year whereupon he was cornered in the second-floor boys bathroom by a pair of red Doc Martens, barely visible from under the stall Lance currently occupied.

“Hey,” someone said on the other side.

“Uh,” Lance replied smartly. And also, because he panicked, “it’s occupied.” He hadn’t been doing anything, just some…public art. (The Beatlez Zuck!—red sharpie on plywood.)

“Yeah, I know. It’s me, Keith”

This last statement was weird. Not because Lance didn’t know who Keith Kogane was, but because Lance didn’t think Keith remembered who he was. Not after that disaster of an interaction the previous Friday. (Lance had called Kogane his rival. The embarrassment. Keith simply walked away looking confused.)

“Hey buddy. Fancy meeting you here,” Lance said since this was clearly an _ambush_.

“Ditto,” Keith said.

Lance chuckled nervously. “So. Is there a reason for this…tête-à-tête?” he pronounced tête-à-tête like tit-uh-tit.

Here, a long, awkward pause in which no one spoke.

“You play guitar right?” Keith asked tentatively.

Despite himself, a burst of excited expectation thrummed through him like the flutter of a hummingbird’s wings. He had hoped—but hope was too strong a word—but he had hoped to someday play with Keith. Lance hummed in assent. And then, because he wanted to make himself super clear: “Yeah—I mean yes!”

“Right,” Keith said. “Um, are you free this weekend?”

Lance thought about the new stack of hand me down records sitting at home—the ones Veronica left for him as she left for college. Lance ignored the pang of loneliness. “I am probably free, yeah.”

“Good, great. Because we need a new guitarist.”

Lance perked up. “We?” For some reason, the thought of being in a band—an actual band, not an orchestra—had never occurred to him. But the more he thought about it the more the idea made sense. He pictured himself playing back to back with Keith Kogane, two stars colliding, and felt a burst of excitement bubble inside him.

“Yup. Can you be at this address next Friday at 5 PM sharp?” Keith said as the muddy Doc Martens edged closer. A pale hand with spider-like fingers and square nails handed him a slip of notebook paper with something scribbled in blue ballpoint pen.

Lance took the sheet with shaking hands. “Cool.” He tried to mask his excitement but it showed when his feet wiggled without his consent.

“See you there,” Keith said. Lance couldn’t see him but he sounded like he was smiling. Lance pictured the curve of those lips, petal pink, the lower lip bigger than the top. (How Lance knew how to project the perfect image of a smiling Kogane was not something he was too willing to look into.)

“Sure thing.”

The muddy Doc Martens walked away, leaving greasy prints on the linoleum.

♪

And, that was how _McClain_ remembered being asked to join Voltron. Due to contractual agreement, we are obligated to document both versions of the event within this title.

♪

Lance found himself in front of a small powder blue house with a modest, well-kept lawn. Anywhere from three to seven days from that encounter—whichever version the reader chooses to take as truth—and Lance barely had the courage to ride here. His bike lay beside him, bent into a shape like a stick insect in the late September sun. The grass was patchy but well kept, with three small gnomes standing guard near the mailbox. Lance had tripped over the smallest of the three. The gnome simply lied there in distant offense.

Lance, still panting from the exercise began to nervously hype himself up to knock. He was still muttering to himself when the door opened and a young man stood before him. He ran a hand across his ashy brown hair, a set of rectangular glasses were settled delicately along his fine pointed nose.

“Lance, right?” The man knew his name. “I’m Adam,” he offered. There were no explanation on his parentage to Keith, but judging by their differing ethnicities (i.e. Adam was clearly not Asian and Keith clearly was) he was not a parent. That and that fact that he didn’t look a day past twenty-five.

Lance smiled in what he hoped was a cool way, a way that would make Keith Kogane’s cool adult friend want to be friends with him too.

“Oh,” Adam looked down at Lance’s hand. Lance followed his gaze and was surprised to find he still had his guitar case in hand despite how his slick with sweat his palms felt. He hefted the guitar case higher up as if to say, ‘See, I was invited’.

Taking this as sufficient proof, Adam stepped aside with a shrug.

Lance took a small, tentative step across the threshold. The inside was all warm colors and mismatched furniture. Exactly how he’d imagined any place where Keith Kogane could spwan from. (Not that he had dedicated a significant amount of head-space to deliberating that…) There was a dining room piled full of papers, mail, newspaper clippings of store sales, etc.

“Make yourself at home,” Adam said as he padded towards the kitchen. “Keith should be outside.”

Lance nodded. Normally he had trouble not talking, but he felt intimidated by this man who Keith Kogane lived with. He felt a strange need to impress him.

Add to that the nerves of playing in front of someone alone. He had never played in front of anyone alone, not without the orchestra backing him up. It’s a thought that terrified Lance, but it’s also a thought—of playing in front of Keith Kogane and _with_ Keith Kogane—that brought him into nervous jitters, setting butterflies in his stomach.

A record player sat with a record mid-play, a big headset attached. Whoever had been playing was very private so of course Lance walked toward the player, set the headphones atop his head and played the record at exactly the moment it had been stopped. The brassy sound of some rock band exploded through his headset, singing ‘ _taken in by the light_ ’. Lance wasn’t allowed to listen to rock music at home, not in the family record player at least. He liked this though. He liked the brassy string beats and unconsciously started humming along to the song. 

Distantly, Lance registered the muffled sounds of shuffling steps and then of someone speaking close by. He startled when he felt the firm press of a palm on his shoulder and hastily slid the headphones off. He turned to find Adam staring at him behind thick, straight lashes.

“Sorry…,” Lance said, setting the headset down gently, guilt coiling in his stomach.

“It’s not a problem. Keith just always forgets to return them to their sleeves. Takashi is usually the one who does the cleaning around here but...” Adam trailed off. “Anyways, Keith’s in the shed in the backyard.”

Lance just said, “‘Kay,” and left, feeling the back of his neck and the tips of his ears grow hot.

♪

Keith didn’t hear the knock on the wooden frame of the door to his private studio—although studio was generous, In truth it was actually a storage shed, filled to the brim with records—all carefully stored in their original sleeves. He was busy tinkering with a faulty headphone jack, trying to twist it just so, when Lance McClain entered, guitar case in hand.

“So here is where—” Lance McClain’s voice bellowed behind him. Keith started, jumping a foot into the air. He turned to find the boy—Lance, his mind provided traitorously—standing over him, one shoulder leaning against the door-frame, the summer sun casting him in shadow. Keith squinted against the light.

“You’re barefoot,” Lance noted as he stared at Keith’s toes, as if entranced. “I mean…your brother let me in…sorry.”

“Lance! You came.” He hadn’t meant for his words to sound so surprised. “Adam is just my brother’s...friend,” he added in lieu of anything else to say. In reality Adam was practically Keith’s brother-in-law but that was not information they made privy to most people. Word got around in towns like Altea.

Lance set something down on the couch that sat along the far wall of the shed. It was the only wall not covered floor to ceiling in shelves stuffed to the brim with records or knick knacks, all part of Keith’s growing collection of musical paraphernalia.

“Wow man, this is a nice place you got here,” Lance said as he turned in a circle to assess the room.

Keith looked around the small shed, trying to see it how someone with new eyes would see it. The scattered records, the stained rug, a pile of discarded bass strings sitting in a corner. (Keith had tried to fix them by boiling them.) His schoolbag, sitting ignored exactly where he left it. The couch, beer-stained, sunken in, the velvet faded to a dusty blue instead of its original royal. Keith had no idea what Lance saw when he saw all of this.

“So how do we go about this?”

Keith felt his neck and cheeks grow hot. In truth he hadn’t thought Lance would show up, his surprise was clearly enough indication of that, but he didn’t know how to relay to Lance that Keith was just as lost in this.

“I didn’t think you’d show up,” Keith said, going for transparency.

“Why? Didn’t think some orchestra geek would know anything about rock and roll?”

Keith quirked his brow at the completely un-ironic use of ‘ _rock and roll_ ’.

“Do you know anything about rock?”

Lance McClain bristled and defensively shoved his hands into his pockets.

“I like the Beatles.”

Keith rolled his eyes. “Congratulations. You and half a billion other people.”

Keith didn’t mean to be condescending, it’s just that he had a hard time believing someone didn’t know about rock and roll. For Keith it was like heritage. His father raised him on jazz, rock and roll, rhythm and blues. For Keith music was like his first language. He felt a slight pity for someone like Lance—someone who seemed to crave so much more but wasn’t allowed. (Keith thought to himself a small list of records he could lend Lance.)

♪

Keith Kogane rolled his eyes at Lance McClain. And that just—it niggled at some primal part of Lance’s brain because suddenly he wasn’t feeling sheepish or nervous. Instead he felt… _annoyed_. Who did this boy think he was? Just because he was good looking and a bit cool he thought he could just be rude to him without consequences?

Lance was about to say some very choice words about where this jerk could shove his beautiful, polished cherry wood Fender when he heard hard tapping from the back of the storage shed. Lance was only just finding the outline of another door when it burst into a sliver of sun and a familiar beady-eyed girl with a disheveled crown of golden brown hair tried to step in only for the door to catch on the corner of the couch.

“Hey Keith, can you let me in?” They were referring to the small sliver of space where the storage shed door gaped like a sideways mouth. Lance had assumed it was to let in the summer light but now he supposed it was more of a side entrance. “C’mon, I know you guys are in there!” Lance recognized the voice from the daily announcements of the AV club. This was Katie Holt in the flesh.

Kogane ambled onto the couch and began dragging it sideways, blocking the door further.. Lance considered getting up and helping, but a part of him was enjoying seeing him struggle to heave the couch. _Serves him right for not letting Pidge Holt in_ , Lance thought to himself.

Keith glared at Lance once he was done. Lance found he liked the thrill of having those eyes on him, even like this.

“Fine, I’ll just go all the way around,” Pidge said.

Keith groaned but relented. This time Lance did help him pull the couch to give Pidge Holt some room to pass her cartoonishly long rectangular case.

“I heard from Matt, who was told by Adam, that you were trying to form a band.,” Pidge said as she climbed over the couch and the case and into the room. She was wearing jean shorts and a baggy t-shirt, and her glasses sat atop her head.

“Yeah, and?” Keith said.

“And I’m in,” Pidge said with the striking confidence of someone who has not been told no very many times in their life.

A long moment of silence and then, just like that, the tension dissolved. Keith and Lance met eyes and Keith huffed out a small chuckle. “Don’t even dream of it.”

♪

They held auditions in the high school auditorium. Lance made fliers.

In the end only one more person showed up. He was a brown-skinned burly guy who went by Hunk and he brought cookies. Lance was in love instantly.

♪

(Note to the reader: no one has yet to discover Hunk Garrett’s legal name.)

♪

> " **Hunk Garrett:** 'I kinda always just gravitated towards jazz and soul and…' [ _Looks at distance, as if in reminiscence._ ] 'I sort of realized that the bass what at the heart of all of that and ever since then I was hooked…'"

—transcript from ‘De-Formed Voltron!’ docu-series originally aired on VH1 in 2007

♪

Pidge Holt was a fierce musician and she had an ear for rhythm. The way her hands, like two small birds, traveled along the set of a keyboard was awe-inspiring.

Keith would have been glad to have her in the band as their keyboard player. She would have been good at that. Except for this fact: “I want to be the drummer.”

Keith was not sexist but he had a hard time imagining little Katie holding her own with the drums. “Katie—"

♪

> " **Pidge Holt:** 'At first I just did it to get at him for making me ask my brother out for him…' [ _Chuckles_.] 'He was eight, I was five so it was all very innocent...But then it [ _drums_ ] was just sort of a…' [ _Pause_.] 'It was like the most intimate thing I could ever experience. The rhythm, the connectedness. The drums were like the skeleton behind all that—and I loved being a part of that.'"

—transcript from ‘De-Formed Voltron!’ docu-series originally aired on VH1 in 2007

♪

“My name is Pidge.”

“It’s actually Katie,” Keith said between grinding teeth. “And we can’t let a thirteen-year-old _tween_ join the band.” Keith wasn’t very old himself at just a few weeks shy of his eighteenth birthday but… _thirteen_. “Go outside while we talk about this Katie.”

“It’s Pidge,” Pidge said with a pout but otherwise obeyed.

“She’s in high school,” Lance protested. Keith wasn’t entirely sure Lance really wanted Pidge to join the band or if he was just being difficult to spite Keith but either way he would not let a little girl join. Even if she did dress less like a boy scout and more like...anything Keith had seen girls wear on TV. (Keith had very little interest in what girls were currently wearing but he was pretty sure whatever Katie wore was not _it_.)

“She’s my tiny neighbor!”

“She is tiny,” Hunk said. “I feel like I can fit her head in the palm of my hand.”

“She’s in high school. And a senior.” Lance said.

“She’s in high school and she’s a prodigy pianist,” Keith protested.

“Exactly,” Hunk said, siding with Lance, like a traitor.

“Exactly,” Keith said. “Why would she want anything to do with us if she can play Rachmaninoff with her eyes closed?”

From the other room Pidge said, “and Chopin!”

Keith swung his arms in a see gesture. As in: _See what I have to deal with?_

From the other room Pidge said, “Can I come in? Are you done yet?”

Keith sighed. Hunk grinned good-humouredly.

“I say we vote on it,” said Lance.

“No! It has to be unanimous!” Keith protested.

“I agree with Lance. A vote seems fair.”

“Raise your hand if you want Pidge Holt, pianist extraordinaire and future drummer prodigy, to join Voltron!?” said Lance from the front of the orchestra practice room, standing before the podium usually used by Mr. B during choir and orchestra rehearsals.

“We aren’t calling it Voltron,” Keith said and maintained his arms clasped to his sides.

Lance and Hunk raised their hands.

“Raise your hands if you want to call us Voltron!” Lance said.

Lance lifted his arm high into the air. He wiggled his eyebrows at Hunk until Hunk gave in and raised his hand. From the other room the door opened and a single, small hovering arm flew into the air.

“What does that even mean?” Keith said. “Voltron. It sounds like a motor oil brand.”

“Number one, no one here knows or cares about motor oil except you Mullet. And numero dos, Voltron is actually the name of my favorite comic book hero growing up.”

“Oooh, I remember that,” Hunk said. “He was formed at the end of every issue, like a hero made up of tinier heroes!”

Keith cringed. If he was being honest, he remembered it too. He would see if when he and his father would take him two towns over to the better comic book store once a month. A dull pain ached in his chest.

“Fine, whatever,” he said, wanting nothing more than going home and curling into a ball for a couple of hours. Grief was he was prone to doing that to him. (Less and less now though, and that hurt too.)

Keith got up, slung his guitar along his back. “I guess we’re Voltron now. See you guys tomorrow.”

“What’s with him?” he heard Lance say to Hunk as the door swung closed behind him. The voices of his bandmates faded as he walked the long hallway into the outside. The sun was setting and the heat of the afternoon sun was dry on his skin. The air had that empty feeling that came with the dying day. Despite himself, Keith felt the anxious flutter of excitement and allowed himself a smile. For the first time in a long time, he was excited for tomorrow.


	2. baby bird (lavender lover)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Voltron takes a while to get their shit together and Lance has some confusing feelings to deal with.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I nursed this chapter like a beer at a party but I was just lazy to edit it because of how long it is. I swear I didn't make it so long on purpose, it just happened.

> “ **_Takashi Shirogane:_ ** 'I can’t really make any comments as to _how_ the band formed. By the time I got back from—' [ _Clears throat._ ] ‘...I found an already fully-formed entity—and an entirely different Keith.' [ _Laughs. Tears up._ ] 'For the first time since I had met him when he was twelve...it seemed like he was finding people like him… _friends_ .’ [ _Wipes tear._ ] 'Now...Lance though.' [ _Laughs, nostalgic._ ] 'Those two were like sworn enemies from the start. Everything was always a competition for them.'
> 
> 'But…' [ _Thoughtful_.]
> 
> 'But—whenever they were able to work together—whenever they were able to put the personal aside…I always got the impression there was something deeper. Like they had a connection none of the rest of us were in on…' [ _Chuckles reminiscently_.] 'I guess you could call it a different kind of magic.'"

—Takashi Shirogane transcript from Interview with _Rolling Stone_ , _Voltron 50 Years Later_ , June 2020 Issue

**September 12, 1969 — October 22, 1969**

♪

During that first autumn, they could hardly call themselves a band; they were more a scattered set of cogs yet to be attached to any mechanism. But mechanism or not, they all had to have a good place to practice to become anywhere near good to get signed, as they'd settled this as the top priority.

("What do bands _do_?" asked Pidge. 

"They get record deals," said Lance. 

"And sing their songs in public," added Keith.

“How much public are we talking?” said Hunk. 

“Hundreds!” said Lance with enthusiasm.

"Hundreds?" Hunk as he began to shake with nerves.)

"First we need a place to practice," said Pidge, taking an organizational role.

"We can practice here," Keith said, here being Keith's sloppy shed that always smelled of cigarette ash. (Lance was convinced Keith was a secret smoker.)

Lance thought to himself that his basement was as good as Keith’s stupid shed but for reasons, even he had to agree with, Keith's shed quickly became their de facto meeting place. 

Firstly—other than Lance—Keith’s was closest to most of them. Add to that the closeness of the little, second-hand record shop a few blocks from Keith’s house, and Keith was happy. It was where Keith bought all his records from—As well as the place across from which Pidge got all her pirated copies. Keith absolutely loved it. It had no importance to this current issue but Keith counted it as a pro, which Lance counted as a con. (Anything that made the mullet happy was a con in his book.)

Secondly—Keith’s shed was huge _._ It had a window the size of the entire wall that let in the sun when it was rising. (Lance complained it was not good for the records.) It was more like a small studio than a shed, with enough space to spread around and play without getting into each other’s space. Pidge’s drum kit also fit into the shed, leaving enough space for the rest of them. 

Thirdly—Keith owned one and a half amps. These were heavy to move so it was more convenient to leave them where they were. Lance called dibs on the powder blue one, which turned out to be the half working one; Keith laughed in his face. 

And then, the _Shiro_ reason—Keith referred to him as his “legal guardian”, whatever that meant, but didn’t speak of him otherwise. 

Shiro who, "Won't be home for the foreseeable future,” had a roommate called Adam. This was the cool adult friend whom Keith lived with. Adam usually worked nights doing his residency at the local clinic. Which meant Keith had the house to himself more often than not. 

Which meant they could be as loud as they wanted to. 

The day they were set to move in their equipment Lance sat eavesdropping from Keith’s living room. All he had was his acoustic guitar, he didn’t really _need_ to be there, so he was trying to make himself as small as possible by pretending to read an old edition of _National Geographic._

“—so long as you don’t disturb the neighbors,” Lance heard Adam warn as Lance tried to focus on a photo of a Balmera whale. (The title read LARGEST WHALE YET.)

To which Keith said, “We only have the one,” referring to the two house cul-de-sac property they shared with the Holts. (Keith and Pidge's parents had apparently been friends.)

Pidge Holt was, at that exact moment carrying her newly bought second-hand drum kit into Keith’s aforementioned shed. She was carrying just the drumsticks and a cymbal while her brother Matt—who Lance thought Keith was being _awfully_ nice to—carried all the rest.

“Please don’t knock over my records,” Keith said to Pidge as he followed them into the shed. “Matt you can just put that wherever.” 

Lance felt a prick of annoyance, like a tiny little rat had stabbed him with a tiny little sword. 

Matt Holt was skinny for a college sophomore, Lance noted bitterly. 

And then, going back for seconds, we will reiterate: Keith's shed was seriously _huge_. 

Lance, trailing after the rest of them, was the last to see it all come together. 

He felt frozen in awe as he entered the threshold of the shed, let his eyes adjust, he saw the magic of the place. Floor to ceiling records on two walls. Here the blue couch on the center of the wall, facing the horizon. Here the emerald ottoman they all kept stealing from each other, here the instruments… Here Pidge's drum kit shining most of all between all the melee of cords and such. Against the wall, he saw Keith's red electric Fender and a nice creamy yellow number Lance assumed must be Hunk's. 

Lance basked in the sunlight the window let in. 

_Holy crow_ , Lance thought to himself holding back a smile. _We're really doing this._

And finally, to Lance’s demise, the acoustics. Oh, the _acoustics._ They were good. Surprisingly good. Keith made Lance belt out an entire [bolero](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2zXJyVBGmg) song right in the middle of the room just to prove to him that the acoustics were _that_ good. Lance even danced some salsa along with the singing which made Keith’s cheeks turn a dusty pink. 

♪

In those first weeks in September, they did very little practice. Lance didn’t have an electric guitar—and even when he was doing extra chores around the house in exchange for some extra cash, he was still 300 dollars short.

Not only that but things weren’t going as planned with the whole record deal thing. In their teenage brain they thought they recognized how hard it would be to get a record deal but how could they even get a record deal if they couldn't even get to play. 

Hunk had a decent off-yellow bass but it made a crackling noise when connected, output jack almost surely faulty. The static as he kept trying to twist it just so drove Keith crazy and always derailed practice by at least fifteen minutes. Pidge for whatever reason had, instead of developing her rhythm, seen it devolve until she seemed so skittish that she couldn’t do a basic rudiment. 

Keith was always fast, Hunk was always slow. Lance never managed to sing on time. Nevertheless, Lance McClain smiled back at his band every time.

♪

> “ **_Lance McClain:_ ** ‘All of this was to be expected, of course…It’s part of the fun of playing with other people, in my opinion.' [ _Gestures with hands_.] 'That getting in sync part. The learning each others’ rhythms part.' 
> 
> [ _Scoffs and smirks._ ] _'_ I was patient. _I_ had no doubt that we would get there eventually.' [ _Smiles earnestly_.] I just couldn’t shake the feeling that _we_ were somehow doing something that was…’ [ _Looks off-screen._ ] ‘... _Meant.’_ [ _McClain grins, looking to the wings of the stage._ ] ‘Keith though…he wasn’t so patient…’”

—transcript from ‘ _The Late Later Show_ ’ Interview, March 25, 2017.

♪

Lance decided pretty quickly into their relationship that Keith Kogane was not worth his time. How he came to this conclusion was not, in his seventeen-year-old brain, much of a complicated issue. It involved slights one and two and three.

♪

And then, a fourth, but we'll get to that one.

♪

First, it involved a slight at Lance’s pride: 

Monday, September 14. 1969, still. 

The emotion and excitement of being a part of something was still a deliciously raw ache in Lance's chest. Lance felt his heartbeat quicken as he made his way to the corner table next to the rear exit, brown lunch bag already ruined in his too-tight fist. 

Keith had been sitting alone at this table during their lunch hour every day since freshman year. (Lance didn’t allow himself to think too much on why he knew that.) 

He was usually seen strumming an old pale guitar. At this exact moment, Keith was doing just that, looking down at it, somehow muting the strings with the fleshy part of his palm and plucking a tune that felt to Lance like pricking holes into a sheet of paper. 

Keith had yet to notice him so Lance took a second to _observe._ His eyes traced the line of his wrist as he held onto the neck of the guitar; the delicate pluck of long fingers on steel strings. A soft hum came from plump, carmine lips, almost as if he didn’t notice he was doing it. Nothing seemed, to Lance, more instinctual than Keith Kogane with a guitar. 

Lance gulped and mustered a cheerful, “Hi!” vaguely directed in Keith’s direction.

It settled into the air and dissolved into silence. Lance adjusted his backpack over his shoulder nervously and swallowed again. 

For a second he thought Keith had not heard him until his fingers stopped, and he looked up just with his eyes, gray like a shock of storm and thunder. Keith’s lips were too red, his eyes too big; Lance didn’t know what that had to do with anything but it annoyed him.

Keith looked— _Dangerous,_ some part of his brain whispered. ( _Beautiful,_ some even subtler part he didn't acknowledge said.)

“Hey. What’s up?” Keith said dryly. He turned back to his soft strumming. 

Lance slid along the cafeteria bench until he was sitting across from Keith. He set down the brown lunch bag and began taking out his lunch. 

“We haven’t had a chance to talk a lot huh. How’d you even get the idea to start this band stuff?" Lance took out a Tupperware full of ropa vieja. "—Hey, and I think we had Algebra together sophomore year. Do you remember? I sat—”

Keith hunched his shoulders over his guitar and squinted his eyes at Lance's perfectly normal lunch, assessing him. “Sorry. Doesn’t ring a bell.”

Lance felt an uncomfortable pang. “Oh.” A pause. “Really? I sat, like, literally right behind you. One time you made a comment on my t-shirt. Said you went to the same concert—” 

Lance remembered because he'd had that interaction stuck in his head for a week.

Keith shrugged like it was no big deal. Lance felt a needle-thin jab at his ego. 

"What about Pottery? With Mr. J?" 

Keith mumbled something that Lance couldn't pick up, his cheeks going a rudy red. _It looks like a friggin' rash_ , Lance thought. (Lance quietly found it endearingly splotchy, which confused him.)

Keith Kogane's Adam's apple bobbed up and down as he swallowed, gathered his things and muttered a hasty, "See ya," as he walked off without another word. The tips of his ears were red as they peeked from under the dark mullet. 

Lance stood still for a second, not really aware of what had just happened. 

He had only been trying to—Lance wasn’t sure _what_ exactly he had been trying to accomplish. (Just that he wanted, desperately, to talk to Keith Kogane.) He didn't know _why,_ but Kogane just made him nervous.

Yet, Lance McClain gave no second chances. So what! He tried to be friendly and Keith Kogane had been an asshole about it. Big whoop, _Guess we'll just have to keep it professional,_ Lance thought to himself as he bit angrily at a pear, ignoring the deep feeling of shame and worthlessness as he watched Kogane walk away.

And so it began.

♪

> " **_Hunk Garrett:_ ** 'Lance had a whole list of things he hated about Keith.' [ _Chuckles._ ] 'Like his shaggy hair—said it was too girly. Really, from the start, he just had complaint after complaint, but I just think he was just sweet on him and just…' [ _Pause._ ] 'Did not know how to deal with those feelings, y'know. But what do I know, hindsight is 20/20 right?'"

—transcript from ‘50th Annual Grammy Awards’ Interview, _E! News_ , Feb 2008

♪

Second, it involved a slight at Lance’s talent. Simply put:

Once Pidge and Hunk joined and claimed drums and bass respectively, the discussion of who would play lead guitar arose. Lance wanted to because it was cooler. Keith insisted the better player should do the part, i.e. Keith _according to Keith._

“—and you have to sing so won’t it be hard for you to do the lead at the same time?” 

“And who says I wanna sing?” Lance said with a smirk. 

Keith shrugged. “You _are_ the best one.”

“You say that but if I recall you’re the only one we haven’t heard sing.” Lance jabbed a finger in Keith’s chest. (He pinched the fabric of Keith’s flannel, feeling the softness that came only with extensive wear.)

Keith pinched his eyebrows stubbornly. “I don’t sing.” 

“Oh, you don’t sing? Don’t you think that’s convenient? Because you are the one who can’t sing and play lead at the same time! And that's why you're making me sing because you don't want anyone to find out you can't do both either!” Lance was so close to Keith he could see little dots of stubble on the very edges of his jawline. (He felt his fingers twitch as if to reach out and rub his thumb over it.)

“Lance! I just know you’re a better singer,” Keith said as he gestured with his arms emphatically. His usually grey eyes twinkled almost violet in the dusky lighting of the setting sun. 

“How do you know? Sing right now and we’ll settle this,” said Lance, as always, trying to turn everything into a competition. 

Keith just wanted to be the star by relegating Lance to rhythm guitar. Everyone knew that it was always the lead guitarist who got all the groupies. How would he ever be able to showcase his talents if he was the _George Harrison_ _of Voltron._ (To the reader we would like to remind of the silent appeal of George Harrison as well as to say the irony of this statement does not escape us.)

Hunk and Pidge were sitting on the couch adjacent to the window, feeling there could be a better use for their time. 

♪

> " ** _Pidge Holt:_ ** 'Lance was always very…insecure about Keith. Here Lance is, probably one of the voices of his generation, and yet _he…'_ [ _McClain_ ] '...was constantly fighting against the current about how he felt about _him._ [ _Kogane._ ] And he just…' [ _Pauses_.] 'Looked for reasons to antagonize him. I think he just wanted the lead guitar role because it would mean he got Keith Kogane’s attention.' [ _Chuckles_.]"

—transcript from _‘De-Formed Voltron!’_ docu-series originally aired on VH1 in 2007

♪

Then came slight the third; this involved a slight at Lance’s music, as such:

Much as Lance enjoyed the patient process of “finding their sound” or whatever they had called it, he felt that—at least until he could afford to buy an electric guitar—he had little of substance to contribute to the band. 

Good things tend to work themselves out though. You see, ever since he was gifted a guitar at the age of twelve, Lance was obsessed with the idea of becoming a composer. A songwriter. He had no difficulty coming up with catchy tunes or some thought out purple prose but it was in the structure where he got caught adrift. 

It had not been an easy choice. The idea of showing the rest of the band his songs brought a memory to the forefront of his mind. He’d blocked most of it but he remembered a talent show, looking down at the people on the stage and seeing the disinterest in their faces. Realizing— _Oh, I’m not special_.

Keeping this in mind, he still decided he would dig out his old songs and show them to the band. Sure they weren't perfect but it had to be a start, So he packed his old spiral notebook, with his silly song scribblings, and biked to Keith’s with the intention of showing them what he had worked on.

Keith, though—he was not as patient. The fire in his eyes burned brightest when they were failing and that made something uncomfortably pleasant twist in Lance’s gut. The light in his eyes when he played in these instances was a fierceness unparalleled. Keith had the makings of a rock star: the gravitas and the nonchalance, the scowl and the anger.

Lance could hardly look away. (A note: This often meant getting burnt.)

He had thought Keith would accept the input. Or at least that he would listen. But when Lance nervously carried him aside during practice, hands shaking as he showed Keith his tattered notebook filled with the deepest parts of himself, Keith only huffed. 

“Do _you_ write music?” It was in the way Keith said it. Like the mere thought of an interesting idea coming across Lance’s mind was too criminal to consider. 

In the span of three heartbeats, Lance’s mood went from jittery nerves to shame and dread. The pit of his stomach felt like a sinking hole.

And then, in the span of ten heartbeats more, as is wont to happen when pride is spurned, Lance’s mood went from shame to anger. Lance swiped the notebook from Keith’s exploring fingers with a frown and chucked it in the garbage can sitting in one corner.

Practice that evening went on as normal but when Lance biked home, legs burning with the exercise, something that had been slowly curdling finally solidified into an answer. _I hate Keith Kogane_ , he thought to himself, a vow as he slapped his palms against his bike handles. “I fucking _hate_ him!” he shouted into the cool autumn night, said more out of the need to really feel it. His legs ached as he pedaled home. 

> ♪
> 
> “ ** _Hunk Garrett:_ ** ‘I guess you could say we were… unstable… at first.’
> 
> 'Keith and Lance were always fighting about something—but, y’know, we were, what? Sixteen? Seventeen?’
> 
> ‘When you’re that young everything is just so much bigger. And the band was _the_ biggest thing. We were all focusing all our energy on it. I think it took as much as it gave… the band… at first…’
> 
> **_Pidge Holt:_ ** **‘** It wasn’t all bad. I actually have this amazing memory of… I think it was the second or third time we got together? And Keith was in a _mood.’_ [ _Rolls eyes, good-natured._ ] 
> 
> ‘And Lance just...started to belt out this beautiful melody in Spanish. With dancing and everything. To this day he won’t tell me what that song was. But...just...seeing that amount of talent...Lance singing…’ [ _Laughs._ ] ‘And Keith started laughing and here Lance was doing a salsa dance using a towel like one of those, y’know, headdresses. And I remembered thinking, _I’m going to remember this for the rest of my life._ You could always count on Lance to lighten up the mood.’”

—transcript from _‘De-Formed Voltron!’_ docu-series originally aired on VH1 in 2007

♪

The next week Lance arrived to practice early. He remembered Keith's words like they were scarred into the threads of his heart. 

_Do_ you _write music?_ The words ran non-stop in his head as he biked to Keith's. _Do_ you _write music?_ As he left his bike in Keith's front yard as always.

 _Do_ you _write music?_ He didn’t bother knocking, instead choosing to go through Pidge’s back yard and quietly slide through the half-open door of the shed as had become routine. 

—You _write music?_

He expected to find them all there, setting up the amps and screwing cymbals, testing and tuning. Instead, he heard the soft sound of strings plucked into a tender, hesitant melody. He heard a start and then the playing of a little tender tune and a stumble and then restart again with a little change, a note sang differently or a chord progression tried another way. 

As he tiptoed into the room he found Keith, head angled forward, playing that tender gaunt folk tune. Lance felt heat pool in his face when Keith began to hum. He was stepping around the room as if he was in a commanding audience, the pale acoustic guitar of his held like a shield between him and the stage. .

Lance admired Keith’s silky voice even though he wasn’t quite singing words. 

"Keith?"

Keith jumped at least two feet into the air. When he realized it was just Lance he slowly retreated from his protective stance; a startled cat slowly appraising danger. "Lance! What are you doing here so early?" 

"Can I hear what you were singing?"

Keith flushed, looking sideways. "No."

“Why not?” 

_Do_ you _write music?_ Keith, it seemed, _did_ write music. Good music. Lance felt a pang of ugly jealousy. 

“No, I won't play anything. And because why do you care?” Keith averted his eyes. 

“Really?” Lance crossed his arms and leaned on one leg. _Do_ you _write music?_ “You just think you’re better than everyone else don't you?.”

Keith nodded, brow furrowed stubbornly. “Yeah. So?”

As if suddenly noticing how close they were standing, Keith coughed into his hand and gave himself a few steps of space. Slowly they settled on opposite ends of the basement and each began tuning their own instrument in tense silence. Keith kept plucking the fifth string. He did it again and again, the dull thuds of the ill-tuned note grating on Lance’s nerves like the buzz of a meddlesome bee.

“Will you just let me do it for you.” (Lance had perfect pitch, as they'd discovered during one of their few productive sessions..)

Keith turned to him with a blank look and plucked the string again. And again. A small twist of the tuning knobs, a smirk, another heavy pluck at a string. Keith was _messing_ with him.

Lance tossed one of Pidge's drumsticks, hitting Keith straight on the top of his mop of dark hair. 

“Ow. Did you just throw a stick at me?” Keith said, in disbelief

“Just—” Lance stood up with purpose. Keith tensed with anticipation as Lance took three long strides and swiped the guitar from his hands in one deft motion. "Let _me_ tune in."

Keith’s eyes suddenly widened. “Give it back Lance.”

“No. Just let me tune it. Y'know I'm the tuning master.” Lance held the pale wood guitar by the neck. Keith nervously reached his hands towards the instrument as Lance began to pluck at the strings, holding the guitar close. 

“Lance I’m not playing around. Give it back.”

Keith tensed, his eyes traveled, panicked, to where Lance’s fingers wrapped around the neck of the guitar. Some part of Lance told him maybe he was playing at something dangerous here. Another part felt it was too late to back down; if he backed down now then Keith won. 

Keith let out a small, choked out sound as Lance accidentally bumped the guitar against an amp that had been sitting a few feet away. It had been a simple bump against the very corner of the amp but it had Keith trembling. Lance was sure nothing had happened to it but he still felt a stab of guilt at the sound of Keith’s pleading voice as he said, “Lance. I’m serious. _Please_.”

“Tell you what. I give it back and you play something for me.”

“No Lance. Just, give it back.” Keith was reaching for the guitar like a mother would for their infant child. 

“Aw, c’mon man. How are we ever gonna get signed if you won't even sing?" Lance said, trying to make light of the situation. 

“Lance,” Keith stopped everything and looked seriously at him. More serious than Lance had ever seen him before. The feeling of his steel gaze on him made Lance's skin tingle.

“Geez, chill out dude,” Lance stammered, feeling disturbed by Keith’s eyes, shining with unshed tears. “Just play me something and I’ll give it back.”

“No. Just give it back now.” Keith rose from his seat on the floor, stiff and—Lance never thought he would ever think of Keith as vulnerable but that’s exactly what he looked like: Eyes open wide, shining violet, hands shaking. He seemed like he was about to have a heart attack, when—

Keith stepped closer to him. “Give it _back_.” Lance was sure now that Keith was dangerous. You could see it in the solemn stare he gave you as you held his heart in a pair of strings and a piece of wood. 

Lance gulped. Without his permission, his arm bent backward so the guitar was further from Keith’s reach. Lance’s heart stuttered in his chest when Keith’s chest was flush against his, his arm and body chasing after the guitar above Lance’s head. Lance felt the phantom of Keith’s arm pressed against his, from elbow to wrist, and he suddenly couldn’t breathe.

He felt uncomfortably giddy. He didn’t like the burning thrill in his chest. Didn’t understand why _Keith_ of all people was making him feel this way. He had to get as far away from Keith as possible. Especially if this was going to become recurrent. 

Absently, he registered that Keith was still making for his guitar, was still pressed against him, one leg between Lance’s two. Keith’s leg brushed against his inner thigh, dangerously close to—he tried to pry Keith off but in his haste, he fell backward onto the couch. And in his haste, he pulled Keith along with him, their legs so tangled that Keith fell square on top of him. 

Lance sat with his arm held up high. Keith Kogane, who sat in his lap, had eyes only for the guitar in Lance’s hand. They were pressed together from knee to collarbone. Keith reached for the guitar, and didn’t he think this was a little weird? Being so close to another boy that you could smell—ashes and something minty?

Lance’s dick began to harden. But that just had to be because of the barely-there movement Keith was making, trying his hardest to reach the guitar Lance still held over their heads. Without his noticing his other hand twisted around Keith’s lithe frame, fingers dipping under the soft cotton of Keith’s t-shirt, feeling an electric current when his thumb came into contact with Keith's hipbone. 

Lance felt a puff of warm breath against his ear and his dick shifted. 

“Fuck. Ow—” Keith grumbled softly as he fell a little more into Lance's arms. 

Lance’s chest felt uncomfortably tight as he gulped, registering the feeling of Keith’s lips as they accidentally brushed against the erratic pulse of his jugular; Keith’s hand as he placed it on Lance’s shoulder, firm and warm, leveraging himself up. Lance felt for a flickering second, like dropping the guitar, taking Keith’s hips, and pressing them both close to see if he was just as hard. 

Lance came back to his senses. “Sorry,” Lance gasped out as he pushed the guitar between them. 

Keith’s chest was no longer pressed to his but their legs were still tangled together. Keith’s knee was digging into Lance’s hip and yet for some reason, Lance did not want Keith to move.

“Here,” Lance said in lieu of nothing as he raised the guitar between them, like a holy sword in a fairytale.

Keith shook his head. “‘S fine.” He still had eyes only for the guitar. 

Carefully, without touching Lance more than he absolutely had to, Keith reached up above Lance’s head and plucked his guitar from Lance’s tight grasp. Lance’s hand went limp as soon as Keith’s fingers touched his wrist, gently prying the guitar from his grip. Lance looked up to where their fingers were barely brushing, surprised that he hadn’t let go of the guitar in the whole ordeal.

“Uh. Yeah man, I was just kidding, you know that right? Sorry if I freaked you out."

Keith remained silent for the few seconds it took Lance to take his hands back. 

“I can’t believe you fell though," Keith finally said and then, to Lance's surprise, burst out laughing. 

Keith was likely in shock and that's why he was laughing, He had been so afraid of losing his guitar that he had gone into a kind of mental shock. That was the only kind of explanation Lance could come up with. 

Despite himself, Lance felt his lips lift into a grin without his permission and something electric pumped through his veins. (Something magnetic that wanted to reach for Keith’s hand and feel the skin there against his own, palms facing each other—) Lance made a panicked intake of breath as he tried to settle his heart to a steady, slow beat.

No. No _no_ no. Why was he feeling like this? He must be catching something.

Keith was smiling and his cheeks turned red as apples when he smiled. Lance couldn’t ignore this anymore. Lance _liked—_

Keith stood up from the couch and looked to Lance. "You’re being so weirdly quiet? I'm not angry if that's what you're worried about." 

For some reason that made Lance feel even worse. Or better. He wasn’t sure yet. He just knew that the thought of Keith being concerned for him made his chest hurt and his cheeks flame. Maybe he had a fever. He _must_ have a fever.

And Keith was _way too close._ Lance could feel the heat come off of him in waves.

Lance gently pushed Keith away, palm flat against Keith’s chest, Keith stepped away, shifting his weight so he was no longer pressed against Lance. “Yeah. Yeah, just—I don’t know. I don’t think I’m feeling too well."

He asked to call his mom. Keith embarrassedly explained that they didn’t have a phone. 

“Oh, okay, I’ll walk then,” said Lance absently. 

“Adam gets home in—”

“No. I have my bike if I get tired.” Lance said distantly as he left for home. When he arrived he had rationalized it all away, saying it was just teenage hormones, the friction of the moment. Lance went to sleep and by the next morning, he had all but forgotten about it. 

♪

> **_"Interviewer:_ ** 'So what exactly are you? Bisexual sounds like some sci-fi term. Why not just gay?.'
> 
> **_Lance McClain:_ ** 'Well because I'm not gay. I didn't always have a word for it but ever since I met Freddie [ _Mercury_ ] I knew there was just no way I was heterosexual.' [Laughs.] '...He had a magnetism…' [ _Grins_.] 
> 
> 'It just means I like a little of everything, y'know.' [ _McClain pulls high fashion model ‘Nyma’ close by the waist and winks at the camera._ ] 'I can have fun with anyone.' [ _Nyma laughs, as if in on the joke._ ]”

—transcript from _People_ Red Carpet Interview, Mercury Rises Trust Charity Event, November 1999. 

♪

Everyday, little by little, Keith rolled a boulder up a hill. At least that’s how his social worker put it when he was thirteen and acting out his anger by punching his classmates during lunchtime. 

Keith was old enough now to understand the boulder was an analogy for his anger. 

Keith didn’t really understand why he was so angry though. Maybe it was because his Dad had died when he was barely ten. Or maybe it had been because Keith still felt himself choke up every so often every time the only memory of his mother came to him. 

(Skin tan, hair dark as she lifted him into the air, the summer heat pressing against the back of toddler Keith’s head. Keith feels it bubble inside of him, this unconditional love—)

The reason was not important, the only thing that mattered was that Keith _was_ angry. And he either faced the anger or he carried it with him. So Keith carried that boulder up his hill every morning. 

His reward was that at the end of the night, he got to stand at the top of the hill and let the boulder roll down and it wouldn’t hurt anybody. But sometimes he let go of that boulder too early and it fell on top of people and hurt them, like bowling pins on a strike. Nowadays, he successfully pushed the boulder up his hill more often than not. 

And then the next morning he would do it all over again. 

And again—

—and again...

Keith was often at a constant edge, just on the cusp of exploding at a moment’s notice. Being a part of something that involved a lot of teamwork was obviously going to be a challenge. But Keith didn’t think it would be _this_ bad. 

It was a few weeks after Lance's freak out. The one where he ran out of practice before anyone else even arrived without much of an explanation.

("Where's Lance," Hunk had asked. 

"He left early. Said he wasn't feeling too well," Keith had said, trying not to give it much thought. _Is he angry with me?_ He thought lamely to himself.)

Keith was angry. Lance had been absent three times since then.

When Lance deigned to show up, practice was a total bust. Had been for a while actually. Keith wasn’t usually the pessimistic type but they just _weren’t_ working. They had been practicing twice a week for six weeks and Keith had yet to notice any kind of real progress.

Despite Lance’s talents singing—Keith was not begrudged to admit Lance sang as if it were akin to breathing—neither of the other band members was really syncing up. Hunk was really not translating his orchestral cello playing into the bass. And Pidge, much as she claimed to be a piano prodigy, had about as much rhythm as a cricket. (Wrong comparison. Crickets have impeccable timing, they’re like the metronomes of nature.)

“Okay, stop! Stop!” Keith half-shouted during their final practice before fall break.

 _"Stop Lance!_ " Keith had to yell so he could be heard over whatever it was Lance was trying to do with Shiro’s spare guitar. (Adam had agreed to let Keith lend it out with the condition that it only be done in the house.)

“I’m riffin’ dude,” Lance windmilled his arm. (He seemed…nervous? Had ever since that one time. Maybe Lance felt awkward because he knew the guitar had been a gift. But how would Lance know about that?)

One of Pidge’s cymbals kept unscrewing and clacking all over the place. Hunk could not press on the strings hard enough and kept complaining that his fingers hurt. Lance kept trying to get them to sing Celia Cruz, whoever that was.

And they were all driving Keith _mad_.

Keith looked at all three of them in turn. One piercing gray-eyed stare per person. Two, three, four seconds each.

“Que pasa Mullet?” Lance asked in a terrible Spanish accent. (Kay Pah-Sah—which made no sense since the brat actually did speak Spanish.)

“Are any of you actually taking this seriously?”

The three in question shared a look. 

“You do realize we’re all new at this right?” Pidge said petulantly. She was so small at thirteen, that her drum kit towered over her. 

Said drum kit had been permanently moved to Keith’s shed. (Which bothered Keith.)

"I've been playing since I was twelve," Lance said in response to Pidge's comment, but no one noted him. 

Keith felt his forearms strain as he fisted his fingers into the worn denim of his jacket sleeve. “I see that you all came unprepared. Again."

“I think you should take a break man, we’re all tired,” Hunk said as he reached for a bag of chips left on that ugly stained couch. Instead of practicing his form as Keith told him to. (Which bothered Keith). 

Lance was still in between ignoring him and doing this annoying motion with his arms in which he rotated his arm and struck it hard against the guitar strings. (Which _bothered_ Keith.) 

“Jeez, dude. That attitude is no bueno. You know what people like you get?”

Keith looked at him like he very much didn’t want to know.

Lance pointed at his own forehead. “You get premature wrinkles. From all that stress.”

(Correction, _all_ of Lance bothered Keith. )

Pidge got up from her stool and walked to where Hunk was. Stuck her hand in his party size chip bag. Began munching on Doritos like no one’s business.

Between chews, with her mouth open like a savage, she said, “Okay, what’s happening here?” By here she motioned at all of Keith.

Keith breathed deep in and held his breath. Slowly letting it out, he said, “What do you mean?”

“I mean: I thought we were doing this all for fun and you, Mr. Murder, is the real problem here.”

“Really? Because I thought we were doing this to…” Keith felt silly for even thinking it but he said it anyway, “Write music. Serious music. Not—” Keith looked to Hunk, “—An _ode to eating Samosas._ ”

“Hey!” Hunk started. “My Ode to the Delicious Samosa _is_ serious music!”

“Sure is buddy,” Lance agreed as he patted Hunk in the back in a gracious show of camaraderie. 

“Yeah and so is Simon and Garfunkel,” Pidge added. Keith couldn’t tell in what way she was being sarcastic but he could tell she was. 

Hunk shrugged as he indulged in the bag of chips Pidge handed him. 

“Chill dude. We’re just having fun.” Pidge shrugged as well amid bites of Doritos. How many shrugs was that? They were starting to get on Keith’s nerves.

Keith felt a fit of familiar anger bubbling up inside of him, begging to come out.

“Yeah bro,” Lance said. “You need to take a break or whatever.” He licked the Dorito dust from his fingertips and began to page through Keith’s records.

Keith froze when he saw Lance touch _a_ record. Lance was barely pulling the dark black and white case when Keith reached forward and tried to slap Lance’s hand away. Lance got the record quicker. 

What was it with Lance and trying to destroy his only two family heirlooms.

"Put that down," Keith said as he tried not to show the panic in his face. Lance was already pulling Keiko Kogane’s album out of the shelf, where it lay as something only Keith was allowed to touch. 

"Relax dude, it's just a record," Lance said, oblivious, as he looked down at the cover. 

Keith was shaking with anger. Lance was starting to slip the record out of its sleeves. He was getting Doritos dust all over the cover. 

Keith had been doing breathing exercises and calming meditations just as his old social worker had taught him but sometimes—eventually, he lets go. And the boulder falls. And the boulder hits and tumbles and destroys. 

Keith let's go of the boulder. 

“You guys aren’t taking this seriously! That is my Dad's record, you asshole. It’s the last of two things I have left from him.” Keith punctuated this with snatching the record out of Lance’s hands and holding it close to his chest. In a matter of weeks, Lance McClain had managed to pick a scab Keith had left untouched for years. “Pidge you are always here and you don't even practice! Hunk how hard is it to work on your form and grip? You have huge hands, there is no reason why you should struggle pressing the strings! And don't even get me started on you, Lance—”

“You’re not everyone’s slice of pie either buttercup,” Lance said amid the silence Keith’s anger dragged with it. Keith was breathing hard and quick, his heart racing. 

“Fuck you! I fucking quit!”

He didn't look at anyone in the face as he set his guitar gently on the couch, next to where Hunk was sitting and stormed out of his own shed.

♪

> " **_Pidge Holt:_ ** Keith always had a bit of a temper. I think that the first time we got together, it was sort of like a trial we all had to go through. Getting past those personal challenges and working together."

—transcript from _‘De-Formed Voltron!’_ docu-series originally aired on VH1 in 2007

♪

Fall break was usually Keith's favorite, mostly because it always happened to fall during his birthday. On his birthday he always had a routine. He would usually spend the day playing music in his shed, listening to his dad’s favorite record. (He gifted it to Keith on his tenth birthday, only weeks before his death.) Then during dinner, he would help Adam cook. 

“Something with flourish,” Adam would say every year as he braised pork belly or stuffed a chicken into a duck. During the hours-long process each birthday dinner would take, Shiro would always be there in the background, stealing spices or eating off the chopping board. 

Keith wasn’t usually a routine kind of guy but he was fond of this particular one. Getting to spend his days like this was a special kind of reprieve. Or magic. But. Keith tried very much not to think about Shiro, about how he should have been there, with Adam and Keith. Not—

Keith decided to go outside and lay on the patch of grass that was in the back lawn.

He took his portable record player, a wood thing so heavy it should not be allowed to be called portable. But he was—and he hated to admit this—kind of sad. About Shiro? About the band? He wasn’t sure what, all he knew is when he was sad he listened to music. He linked the giant headphone jack and began to hum along to the song. 

Shiro was "out of town” and Adam was at work and he was no longer part of a band he himself had formed. He wondered if he even had been. It had lasted all of a month and some weeks at most. It had been a good month and some weeks though. Lance and Hunk were good. And Pidge might have been good maybe if he had given her a chance.

Keith heaved out a sigh and closed his eyes. A beam of sun was hitting his face, causing his sight to go white-hot. He was at his favorite part of the [album](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bI8P6ZSHSvE) when he felt a kick at the sole of his foot and his closed-lid vision darkened.

“—ith!—eith! _—KEITH_!”

Keith sat up, his open eyes adjusting to their surroundings. And there, standing in the golden afternoon light, was Lance McClain.

Swiftly taking his headphones off, Keith said, “Lance? What are you—?”

“No one was home so I, uh, let myself in.”

“I can see that.” Keith stood up. He played with the thick wires of the headphones in his hands.

Silence.

Keith broke it awkwardly, as so, “Why are— _you’re here_.”

Lance dug his hands in his jacket pockets and squinted up at the afternoon sun. “If I—” Lance took a second. “If I ask you something will you do it? No questions asked.”

“Yes,” Keith said without thinking. 

Lance chuckled. "Well, that was quick. Why would you agree so quickly? It could.be anything." Lance continued to laugh lightly. 

_Because here is a beautiful boy asking me to do something and it feels like the end of the world and if it is, how could I not be with him through it._

Keith didn't answer.

“Okay. Numero Uno, pack your best, most favorite record and meet me out front, I have a surprise waiting for you."

Keith, uncharacteristically, did as he was told, choosing some of his favorite records and packing them in his school backpack, dumping the other contents in the bag directly onto the floor. Then he headed outside where he expected to find Lance and the rest of the band—

“Numero Dos, get on _doll_ ,” Lance said with a wink. Keith didn't notice the rosy flush on Lance's cheeks. 

Keith stared down at Lance from where he was poised atop a pale yellow bicycle with a woven basket in the front. "You want me to what—?" 

“Get on,” Lance said for the second time.

Keith went to the front of the bike, peeked at the flimsy woven basket and handlebars.

“Where?”

Lance sighed. Then pointed. There, attached to the back wheels, were two small poles, that…what? Keith was supposed to ride on? Lance sighed again. Then stood the bike and got off.

“I thought you were smarter than me when we met,” Lance said without the usual bite. 

Despite his words, Lance gently shoved Keith forward. Then kicked him in the back of his right foot.

“Ow!” Keith directed at Lance with reproach in his eyes.

“Your feet! Go,” Lance pointed at the two metal bars, “there!”

Keith blinked. “What should I hold onto?”

Lance sat back down onto the bike.

“Me, Johnnyboy,” he said in what Keith hoped was sarcasm. He thought it was. At least the wink punctuating the end of that sentence seemed to indicate it was. 

“Johnnyboy? Are you the girl in this scenario?” Keith stood atop the bars and scrunched his fingers on Lance’s jacket. 

“No bimbo, we’re both Johnnyboys in this scenario.” 

“What even is a Johnnyboy?” Keith asked, but Lance didn’t hear him as he began to pedal. Keith tightened his grasp, his knuckles brushing the skin of Lance’s neck. 

Keith knew how to ride a bike but it had been years since he owned one of his own, and even longer since he had ridden one with someone else. (The last time was back when he was seven. With his dad.) Riding one this time around, clinging to a boy, was a very different experience.

They made their way around the Altea suburbs, going from the lower-income homes to the nicer parts of the suburbs, Keith focused on the feeling of the wind in his hair, on the off white color of the pavement, the beads of sweat at the nape of Lance’s neck as he pedaled and pedaled.

Lance had been talking the entire bike trip and presently he was blabbering about the dumb comic he still wanted to name their band after. ( _Not ours, theirs,_ Keith corrected himself.)

“So I was thinking,” Lance said between puffs of air, Keith looked down at his thighs, jeans strained with the exercise. “We could make it so all of us, like, color our instruments or something so that they can match the characters in the show—”

Keith didn’t catch all of it but he protested nonetheless: “We are not naming it Voltron!”

“Sure we are. Just like how you’re named mullet now.”

“I’m not. And we aren’t.” Keith didn’t notice when he slipped back into ‘we’.

“Agree to disagree. We held a vote while you were moping and Voltron won three to one.”

“You can’t hold a vote while I’m not there. And I _wasn’t_ moping. And a vote has to be unanimous!”

Keith couldn’t see Lance’s face but he had a feeling he had one of his usual cocky expressions.

“Then what do you call whatever that was you were doing back there?” Lance motioned to the nebulous direction of Keith's house. Keith watched the pavement go by and Keith groaned internally. A cute boy had caught him _moping._

“I was…” Keith stalled, “listening to music. And thinking.”

“Oh yeah? Penny for your thoughts?” Keith was half sure Lance was being sarcastic so he pinched him in the fleshy part where his neck met his shoulder.

“Ow! Did you just pinch me?”

Keith pinched Lance again in answer but he also laughed, tipping his head back, dark strands of hair flowing gently behind him, fingers clenched in the rough fabric of Lance’s jacket, on to some uncertain destination. 

♪

About thirty-seven minutes later they arrived at said destination: it was a house the color of eggshells with a freshly mowed lawn in which a little boy and girl were digging up mud near a rose bush.

“I asked my sister to drive me but she said no and I can’t really drive yet so…” They both looked at the bike they had just gotten off from. Keith’s hands were sore from where he had held on too tight, and Lance’s shirt was stretched at the shoulders from where Keith had held on.

Lance was catching his breath, the little boy and girl running up to them. ( _"Tio trajo un novio_!" yelled one of the two in Spanish.)

“Anyways, this is why I wanted you to come,” Lance said, still catching his breath as he playfully shoved Keith and slung an arm over his shoulders to lead him in to a half-open garage door on the left side of the house. The summer sun was sifting through the open door, creating squares of light in the pavement. A pair of sneakers edged forward.

“He’s here!” Keith heard the squeaky voice of his next-door neighbor from the other side of the garage door.

Keith bumped his forehead against the door then gravely said, “Hey Pidge.”

A single peanut butter cookie sitting atop a large brown palm slid into view from the other side of the garage door.

“I made cookies,” said Hunk, wiggling the cookie in the air as he too crouched down to greet Keith. 

Keith took the proffered cookie and bit into it. It was the perfect mixture of chewy and crunchy.

Lance, who had been busy storing his bike somewhere off to the side of the house, came back. “What are you doing standing there? Go in.”

Keith did as told, crouching low to pass under the half-opened garage door.

Keith’s jaw dropped.

“So? Do you like it?” Lance said from somewhere behind him.

Lance was talking about the shiny blue guitar sitting like a trophy in the middle of the room. It sat atop a case that lay along a billiards table, and even with the one single bulb of faded yellow light, Keith could see the beauty of the instrument. He didn’t even bother looking at the brand it seemed so unique in appearance—with swirls of different shades of sapphire, royal, midnight. Blues, blues, blues. It seemed so unique that the thought of branding it other than as _Lance’s_ seemed egregious. 

“Holy shit Lance.” Keith edged forward and slid a finger across the strings and forgetting any ill will between them. “Where did you even get the money to buy this?”

Lance shrugged. “I’m really good at saving.”

“No way. Allowance does buy you _this_.” But then Keith noticed the nice driveway, the well-kept lawn, and it made a bit more sense. 

“Sure it does,” Lance said flippantly. Keith didn’t know what kind of allowance Lance was getting but it would take Keith more than a year and a half of savings to get something like this.

Keith’s fingers itched to get his hands on the instrument. It was so new that it still smelled of varnish. But it felt impolite to ask. 

Lance took it out of the case and plucked at the strings a bit harder than was required. Keith flinched.

“Sorry. My acoustic guitar fingers aren’t used to electric yet.”

Keith felt shy as he motioned towards the instrument. “May I?”

Lance nodded. “I don’t have an amp yet though. Turns out those’re also crazy expensive.”

Keith took the instrument from Lance, delicate hands, almost caressing over the neck of the guitar. Upon closer inspection, the guitar wasn’t fully blue. It had a blue-tinted varnish so dark and opaque it almost looked like some kind of paint. The end result was a creature so elegant it seemed to be living and breathing as Keith plucked a tentative tune.

“Now that that’s out of the way,” Pidge said from somewhere deeper into the poorly lit garage. “Saved the best for last,” she said as she pulled a cord hanging from the ceiling. The lights shone bright around the space. Keith wasn’t sure what he was looking at. 

Keith had never seen one except on magazines but he was pretty sure this was a home studio; a microphone and what could _sort of_ be considered a sound booth. How much money had they all pooled together to do all of this. Keith had nothing to offer. Why were they telling him this? Were they trying to punish him for something he already regretted? (Because he _had_ regretted it. Since the exact moment after he said it.)

“Is this—”

Lance was grinning next to him. Hunk and Pidge were standing, arms spread wide.

“Sorry I didn’t practice my form,” Hunk said apologetically, but he offered Keith another cookie.

“And I convinced my brother to let me use his room to practice since he’s at college,” Pidge said between bites of her own cookie. “He just asks that I do his Differential Equations homework...a steal if you ask me.”

Lance rested a hand on the small of Keith’s back as if to lead him further into the light.

“So,” he said. “You in mullet?”

Keith wanted to do the whole hard-to-get act but he was honestly so touched by his bandmates that he immediately nodded.

“I’m in,” he said. 

Slowly they all joined hands in a circle as the dusk came in from the open garage door and set them with a feeling of birth and rebirth, a feeling they could not explain to this day, however it is the opinion of the author that what they were feeling was what we commonly know as a _bond_. 

♪

> **BOND**
> 
> bänd • _noun •_ (CONNECTION)
> 
> That pesky thing that you can't cut with any kind of scissor, natural or supernatural. A rope that ties hearts together until the day of death.

—from Lance McClain's memoir, _Clean_. First published July 15th, 2014

♪

They were all sitting in Lance's basement now. It was a wide space with plenty of room and plenty of sitting space.

They sat with their backs against one of the couches. They celebrated with two lukewarm cases of beer shared between the four. Keith, much to all of their surprise, had never drunk a sip of alcohol before that day. 

"Shiro and Adam never let me even though I'm eighteen," Keith had grumbled. (We remind the reader that in 1969 when this event took place, eighteen-year-olds were legally allowed to drink.)

Lance stood up self importantly. “Okay, guys I have something to say.”

“Boo!” Keith yelled, but he was laughing, already tipsy. 

”First and foremost, to the mullet, I will say this, I’m not eighteen until July but when I am ‘m gonna buy you a drink, In the meantime, my parents are outta town,” Lance said. “And as you remember I asked each and every one of you to bring along your favorites, so I thought we could just…drink and listen to each other’s favorite music. Get to know each other through what we love.” Lance rose the half-empty six-bottled case of beer, the liquid shining from the lit fireplace. “ _Salud!_ ”

Hunk, coming in with the pizza and a grin, asked, “What did I miss?”

“Oh, nothing. Just history,” Pidge said deadpan. (Lance knew she said it sardonically but he was sure she was right anyway.)

“Oh, you told them about the record thing?” Hunk’s eyes brightened. “I start, I start!” Hunk tossed the pizza onto the first flat surface and pulled out an album with a street and four men walking across the cover. Keith groaned outwardly but he secretly loved the final entry in this long saga.

“Start with side two,” suggested Keith, thinking of the best song in the album. Lance nodded in agreement. 

Hunk did as ordered and [with a gentle strumming](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bI8P6ZSHSvE), Keith Kogane and Lance McClain's favorite Beatles song began. Lance didn’t take long to start humming along with it. He felt the back of Keith’s hand graze his own as they all laid there and enjoyed the music. 

♪

Later, once both sides of Abbey Road had been thoroughly listened to—Keith demanded they start the first part again and then restart the second part. (“For the musical experience Lance!”)—Pidge sprung up. 

“Mine next,” Pidge said with a grin on her face that felt very _serpentine._

She took her backpack from somewhere behind the couch and fished an orange toned sleeve with a man in a karmic pose in the backlight. She put the record on and as the needle hit the record a calming jazz tune began to play. 

Keith picked up the record sleeve and looked at it for a while. As the music started to become more and _more_ esoteric Keith began to show signs of drunkenness. As such, Keith Kogane began to swing side to side along with a gentle sound of what seemed maracas and rich tones of “yaaa”...“yaaa”...“yaaa”...

It turned out Keith was a happy drunk.

Lance could tell because Keith was leaning into him with a dopey grin. Lance thought of Keith very much as a jumpy chihuahua, so seeing him being so off-characteristically affectionate made something weird sizzle up his throat. 

“’m sorry,” Keith told Lance with a dazed smile midway through Pidge’s record. “For being a jerk and a tyrant.” He placed a hand on Lance’s neck, thumb rubbing his jawline. The ghost of the sensation caused a pull in his navel. "From now on we're a team." Keith finished with a smile and leaned their foreheads together like they were comrades in the war. 

Lance wanted nothing more than to agree. To say, _Yes, we are a team._ But one look from Keith, violet-gray eyes peeking under an inky fringe, and suddenly Lance felt the tips of his ears grow hot, the edges of his lips involuntarily curving up. Words did not come to him for a while. 

Lance settled for, “Whatever. I was an asshole too.” 

He rolled his eyes good-naturedly and smiled. Keith shifted his gaze away but Lance could see he wore a smile very much like his own. Keith removed his hand and Lance had to hold himself from almost reaching for it back. (Lance noticed how the red light coming from the running fireplace, made Keith’s hair reflect white-hot, a chiaroscuro painting set in vivid whites and dark ochres and glowing violet eyes.)

♪

“So Voltron? R’lly?” Keith slurred what felt like hours later, but was actually barely twenty minutes into the second side of Pidge’s record..

"What about it?" Lance took a last bite of cookie. They switched to ice cream, two tubs of creamy chocolate chunk which they kept passing around. It was all very unhygienic but Lance didn’t mind.

“It’s symbolic!” Lance said as he took another swig of beer and chased it down with a spoonful of ice cream.

“Symbolic for what? Being children forever?” Keith chewed his ice cream from his vantage point on the floor. Midway through Lance’s counterargument, they began to really listen to Pidge’s record, which was now a cacophony of animal chanting. Pidge, now nowhere to be found, had not even bothered to set the record to switch.

“Who’s changing that now?” Lance said in a sing-song and through a smile. Keith shifted his gaze away from Lance’s, but he couldn’t seem to help the smile playing on his own lips.

"You're the one with the fancy record player. I don't get how that works." Keith pointed at the record player that automatically set to play another record. Lance's Grandma's Bolero songs came on.

Lance pulled one of his brother’s records from the shelf next to the record player. He chose one at random, knowing he would like any equally. The music taste his family had was one and the same. Lance was McClain on his father’s side but his mother was Cuban and so every McClain had that special Cuban secret: the best taste in music on the planet.

A soft clear female voice began to sing and a rock soul beat began. I felt like little pricks of sound in the background of her beautiful full voice. Lance looked at the cover, laying in a field was a girl with dark skin and hair flowing platinum, framing her face and interspersed with baby's breath. He gave a cursory glance at her name for future reference. He liked her raspy voice and the fact that she couldn't hide her posh English accent.

Lance looked down at Keith who was in his basement rug, laying there, innocently tantalizing. Lance's eyes traveled from the nape of Keith's neck (bony), to the plush of his lips (too), to the set of his eyebrows (bushy). 

Lance found himself slipping from the arm of the couch onto the seat next to Keith, both of them shoulder to shoulder on the carpet against the front of the couch. Lance’s heartbeat was beating so hard he knew Keith must hear it. And his palms—when had palms ever been so sweaty?

“So when exactly are we going to hear _you_ sing?” Lance asked Keith, going for straight and simple. 

“When you loosen your voice,” Keith said quickly. He leaned his drunk mop on Lance’s drunk shoulder and giggled. “When your voice loosens it’ll fall off.”

Lance didn’t have the heart to push him off. He closed his eyes and prayed for this punishment to end soon. 

Hunk looked at the three of them from where he stood: Pidge now messing with the record player, Keith and Lance now sitting side by side having a conversation. A grin grew easily on Hunk's lips.

“What is happening?” he asked like he knew _exactly_ what was happening. “Guys, we’re _bond_ —hic— _ing_.” He threw himself next to the other three on the rug. It appeared Hunk was drunk three. At least Pidge had not been drinking. (Lance hoped.) 

Hunk continued, “We’re bonding through our music.” 

“Wait? Why is the fire— _hic_ —place on?” Lance said, wanting to change the subject.

And suddenly Keith burst out laughing, “Lance.” He motioned him forward, “I told’ya to turn it on,” Keith leaned back as if he was about to tell the punchline of the century, “but I didn’t r’lly need-ed—ed it. I just wanted a reason to be close— _hic_ —" Keith looked back at Lance innocently, as if he expected Lance to actually be angry. 

Keith was definitely the drunkest of them all. 

“Look at us,” Hunk pulled Pidge up and began throwing her like she was a baby. “Pidge we’re bonding!”

Pidge was having the time of her life with her gentle giant friend. She handed him another beer and opened it for him. “Here Hunk, drink this, it gives you powers.” 

Hunk obliged. 

Not unused to taking care of drunk uncles or grandparents and their capabilities of remembrance, Lance decided to distract and to pivot: “Okay, then what kind of music do you play?”

“What d’you mean?” Keith said. “I haven’t play’d my music yet.” Lance recalled the Kinks album Keith had brought with him. (Of course he liked the Kinks. What a pretentious idiot. Lance looked at that pretentious idiot and traced the line of his Adam’s apple.)

Lance hummed. They were all laying with their legs on the couch, backs on the soft rug, staring up into Lance’s popcorn ceiling. Pidge and Hunk pushed him and Keith closer together. He could feel the tips of Keith’s fringe on his forehead when he shifted. This wasn’t the first time he’d been drunk, but it was the first time he had done so with friends. 

“That’s not exactly what I meant,” Lance said. 

“Then what d'you mean?” Keith said. Lance could still hear the drunken slur in his voice. Pidge and Hunk seemed to be slowly falling asleep. 

“Well, I play classical guitar. _And_ I’m about to become the next Hendrix if I’m willing to bet—”

Keith scoffed.

“And Hunk plays in the orchestra too. And Pidge is, like, a child prodigy.”

“Yeah,” Keith said. “Wha’s your point?”

“All I’m saying is that you’re the only one who I’ve never heard play. Like— _hic_ —really play. Not playing like you’re just practicing or playing around.” Lance turned his head trying to find the odd scent he kept smelling. 

He pushed his nose into Keith’s mop of hair, surprised to find it smelled of ashes and some other thing; eucalyptus?. He thought about this for a while longer as his eyes veered to Keith’s hand where it was resting, wrist bent elegantly, thinner than his own, palm up as if waiting to have a handful. 

(The thought of slipping his hand into Keith’s did not leave his mind for the rest of the night.)

♪

Keith was pressed against Lance, and he was pretty sure he was atop a pile of records. He had never been drunk before, he found he liked it. He was angry and happy. He was still thinking of what Lance had said, that whole thing about not playing. Keith felt like Lance was implying he was a coward. 

Keith furrowed his brows. “I can play.” He sounded defensive to his own ears.

Lance shifted so his forehead was pressed against the top of Keith’s head. If Keith didn’t know any better he’d think Lance was smelling him.

“I know you can play man. Jeez. I was just saying, I know you _can_ play, but _what_ do you play? Like, for example, how come you never sing?”

Keith thought about it for a second. “I guess I’m just not a wordy person. I love music but I don’t r’lly listen to the lyrics. I guess, if I had to ch— _hic_ —choose, rock and roll,” Keith said, half-joking. To say rock and roll was like saying he played jazz. The spectrum of what was considered rock and roll was so vast.

Lance snorted. “Yeah, no shit. I mean look at you. But that’s not what I meant.”

Keith sat up straighter and enunciated perfectly, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I think what Lance means,” Hunk started, placating but still drunk, “is that you’ve got a certain _look_.”

Keith shook his head. “No, I don’t mean that.”

(“You dress more punk than anyone I’ve ever met, Like one of those dandy boys from the fifties.” Pidge said with a snort. She didn’t sound drunk thankfully.)

“I meant, what did you mean about _what_ I played?”

Lance shrugged. “I dunno man. I guess I just meant, like, what comes out of you when words aren’t enough.”

Fuck, that was good. Keith could see it to a tune he'd been playing around with.

It came with that typical Lance look Keith had cataloged in his mind as _creative Lance_. The one he recognized from whenever someone said or read something Lance liked the sound of. Lance was no Hendrix but he was a poet, that much Keith had noticed. He had an ear for words. Maybe because he talked so much. 

(A note to the reader, Lance McClain tested college level literacy at the age of ten.) 

“You're so— _hic_ —so predictable,” Keith said with a scoff as he spread his arm to reach for one of the many notebooks that Lance’s family had lying around everywhere. With a poorly sharpened pencil he wrote down: 

_what comes out of you,_

_when words aren’t enough?_

He turned the page so he was looking at it upside down and slid it across the rug at the three others. As if one, all three narrowed in on the notebook.

Lance was the first to speak. “Hey! This is plagiarism!”

“I don’t get it,” Hunk said.

Pidge was paging through the notebook. Besides the small poem, the notebook was full of grocery lists. 

“So you write…poetry?” Pidge said.

“No,” Keith answered with a drunken dopey look at Lance. “Lance does. I just—" Keith reached for a faded sky blue guitar with flowers (originally Lance’s sister Rachel's) and began to play a jaunty song with just the two lines. 

“ _What are words,”_ Keith began, voice monotone, like he were reciting a poem. “ _When you have me?/ And what are words/ When you’ve had enough_ —” Keith strummed a simple chord progression. “ _And so I'm not enough?/ Well I sure do hope/ These words are enough / For you, for you, for you_ —”

Lance edged closer. Pidge handed him the notebook.

“You saw my songs?” Lance said almost reverently. (Lance wondered when Keith had had the time to read his lyrics.)

“Your songs aren’t much to think about if I’m being honest,” Keith said, tactless as ever. “But your lyrics are really good.”

He leaned a little into Keith’s space and smirked. “Oh yeah? Mind _singing_ us one of my famous songs?”

Keith crossed his arms petulantly. He opened his mouth as if he was considering it, thought better of it and closed it again. “I don’t sing.” Keith seemed less drunk now and more sleepy. 

“And why can’t I play lead guitar _and_ write the lyrics?” Lance asked, leaning even closer. 

“I write the music, you write the words; you sing the words, I play the music,” Keith said this as if it was an unbreakable vow between the two of them. 

The current record’s first side ended and Keith, thinking no one paid attention, started it over again. Lance remained on the floor and Keith was so close that his knee dug into Lance’s thigh.

Lance stretched his legs in front of him.

Keith shifted closer to Lance until shoulders and hips and knees were touching, a distractingly solid heat along his side.

Through the rest of the night, they slowly made their way through each of their records, each making their picks at some point or another until the songs ran out. By then the cool chill of autumn night drifted through the open window, and the sky was dark with thick clouds. Pidge and Hunk and Keith and Lance all dreaming the same dream, living life to the same beat. 

♪

> " **_Hunk Garrett:_ ** ‘We weren’t very good in the beginning. But oh that night it was like…’ [ _Laugh_.] ‘Like we were all thinking together. Does that make sense? Like…Like we were working towards something.’
> 
> **_Pidge Holt: ‘_ **At one point we were all lying on the carpet just… humming to the beat of the music. It’s amazing. To find such a connection when you are so young.
> 
> **_Keith Kogane: ‘_ ** Y’know I didn’t—I wasn’t…raised with a mother. And my dad died when I was ten. So before them… before Voltron… Shiro...’ [ _Takashi Shirogane._ ] ‘He was all the family I knew. I would have rather died than to say this at the time but the band… they were like my family. And Lance…? Well he would become more like a partner..'
> 
> **_Lance McClain:_ ** [ _Shrieks unintelligibly._ ] 'It was like that. Like—' [ _Shrieks_.]"

—transcript from _‘De-Formed Voltron!_ ’ originally aired on VH1 in 2007

♪

**October 23, 1969**

♪

When Lance went back to the basement more than an hour later he expected everyone to be gone. Hunk was staying over in the guest bedroom and when Pidge called her brother for a ride, Lance had assumed Keith had gone with her. 

Yet, like a vision, Keith Kogane was there still.

He looked at the watch on his wrist. _12:17 AM._

Lance didn’t think Keith could see him from where he was sitting, because he was playing Lance’s guitar, strumming it softly like it was something precious. It wasn’t connected to anything so the sound was whisper soft and tinny.

Lance stood frozen, standing on the threshold of his own basement, wondering if he should have knocked. Wiping his sweaty hands along his jeans, he absently caught the sound of singing, soft and tender. Barely more than a hum, as always. 

He was not sure why but his heart beat in his chest a bit quicker, his cheeks growing a bit hotter. He was smiling without hardly realizing it. 

It took Lance some seconds but he recognized what Keith was singing.

He didn’t recognize the tune, except...there! Keith had used Lance's original strumming chords and made a fingering arrangement from it. And the words. Those words— _Lance_ ’ _s_ words.

The pages of scribblings Lance had handed Keith before—the one’s Lance had tossed in the trash—Keith had them all spread around him, seemingly using bits and pieces from different sections Lance had written down; and Keith— _Keith had turned them into a song_. A real song. And better than anything Lance could have come up with on his own.

It was slow and soulful, the guitar more like a lullaby in a duet with Keith’s voice—husky yet clear—Keith was singing like exhaling. Like the opposite of breathing; like he needed to get it out so he could let whatever else came back in.

_I toss a coin_

_And hope it lands tails_

_So I can trail after you_

_Oh Baby Bird_

_I sing a song_

_And hope it's a sings itself_

_So I can dance with you_

_Oh baby Baby Bird_

_Oh baby Baby Bird_

_Won’t you leave the birds behind_

_And become lavender,_

_Of mine? Baby Bird o’mine,_

_Lavender lover of mine..._

Lance suddenly felt like he was intruding upon something, and also, like he was being intruded upon. Hearing his words being sung back to him the way they were, in a tune he had not set for them, felt…intrusively intimate. Like Keith was touching a part of his soul in an unwelcome way. But then, why was his heart beating so hard with pride? 

In fact, wasn’t the problem the fact that Lance liked it _too_ much? It was a part of Lance that was mixing with a part of Keith and it left him feeling electric with energy.

Almost without noticing he was suddenly stepping into the light that was coming through the sliver of window. Without noticing he was speaking words. Without noticing, his heartbeat was stuttering, aching, reaching—

“When did you—”

He felt like stuttering. He might start rambling. His throat felt tight and his palms were sweaty. (He wanted more.) He struggled to clear his dry throat as he stepped fully into the room. “Mullet, when in hell did you write that song?”

Lance wasn't angry but he wondered what would happen if Keith thought he was. Lance felt rewarded when Keith jumped like a frightened cat.

“Shit. Lance”—Keith clutched his chest—“how long have you been standing there? Is this going to become a problem between us?"

“Uh, like three seconds,” Lance lied.

Keith sighed in relief. “Oh. Well, hi Lance. Sorry. I was just leaving but I just couldn’t help myself...” Keith trailed off while looking down at the polished guitar reverently. Lance had noticed the way Keith treated his own guitar, he wasn’t surprised Keith turned out to be a guitar dweeb. 

Lance dug his hands into his pockets and gave a sarcastic turn and then a raise of the eyebrow. “I don’t mind you using it though."

Keith’s eyebrows bunched together in the middle. Lance’s stomach felt weird, like the moment before a dangerous drop.

Lance didn’t fully understand it but a thrill went all the way to his toes whenever Keith _looked_ at him. He felt a need to fill the silence. To keep Keith’s eyes on him. Part of it was—and he’d never admit this—but he just wanted to _talk_ to Keith.

So he sat on his haunches next to Keith. “So—” Lance began.

Keith looked at him which Lance found very encouraging, despite the present suspicious scowl. He ignored the embarrassed heat he felt all the way to his ears. “Wh—at’re you working on?”

_“You_ want to know what _I’m_ working on?”

Lance shrugged noncommittally although he really, _really_ wanted to know what Keith was working on. “Not like there’s anything else to do.”

Keith frowned, spine curved against the guitar. Lance was struck by the wounded look beneath dark bangs.

Lance startled. “No, wait. That came out wrong. I am interested in knowing.” 

“Just forget it.”

He stood up from his perch near the couch and set the guitar atop its case. 

“Listen, man. I was just fiddling around. I didn’t think you’d—” Keith wasn’t looking at him. His eyes, dark blue under this light, were travelling from the line of his shoulder to the tips of his fingers and back. 

Seeing Keith ramble just as much was what made Lance calm down. (It also made him want to kiss Keith's check and rub soothing circles down his back, but he would ignore that for the time being.)

“Keith,” Lance said. “It’s fine—” Keith assessed Lance’s expression, his eyes looked dazed with unshed tears. “I’m not angry,” Lance finished lamely.

“Then why do you look like you’re about to burst into tears?” Keith asked. Lance just wanted to reach out and tell Keith it was okay, he would care, _Lance_ would care. 

(For him. About him. Anything. _Anything._ )

Lance sighed as his whole body went limp and he dropped himself onto the sofa, legs spread wide, arms over his face. “Dude.” He breathed, in then out. And then he decided to be honest "You were looking at me, it was like—like—” Lance gulped. He couldn't say it. 

( _Like looking at a sky full of stars. Like seeing the evolution of humanity in the growth of a smile. Like looking into the eye of a hurricane,_ he thought. _Like falling with no safety net and being happy the whole time down_.)

What worried Lance is that some part of him felt like it would be worth it. Like he would jump down a bridge if it were to follow Keith Kogane. Like he would burn from the inside out just to be there when Keith Kogane became a star.

Keith scooted Lance’s legs over with his foot and sat down next to him, careful not to touch. Lance felt the space between them. 

“That song you were singing just now—” Lance trailed off. 

“Oh, that? Just something I’ve been tinkering with.”

“With my words?”

“Yeah?” Keith did the usual thing where he peeked at him from under his fringe. Lance was willing to admit it was...cute. “I didn’t think you would mind. We are a band after all. And I never have anything interesting to say.”

And then Lance said something he would later regret: “I liked it.”

He didn’t say it out of his own volition. The words burst out of him simply because they were true. It was, objectively, a good song. It was melancholic and somehow made Lance feel hopeful. _It’s like its own kind of magic_ , Lance mused. 

“Really?” Keith said, interrupting Lance from his thoughts, probably already thinking of ways to make the song better, more streamlined. .

“I did. I can’t believe we wrote it.”

“What do you mean _we_?” Keith said with a quirked brow but he had a playful smirk across rouge lips. 

Lance felt his face heat up with his presumptuousness. “I mean since we both wrote parts of it… And you said earlier we—” Lance felt embarrassed saying this next part: “It’s like—we’re a good thing. Like I never gave a thought to a tune to that song because I knew it would never sound like you just made it sound. Yin and yang, that’s us.”

Keith leaned his shoulder onto Lance’s. “I didn’t know you knew every song in existence.”—here a roll of the eyes, and then—“I’m sure you would have come up with something interesting eventually.”

Lance grinned and pushed back on the pressure from Keith’s side.. “Anything else you might want to show me?” He meant for it to come out less fond and angrier than it eventually came out as.

Keith’s, either not noticing his tone or deciding to ignore it, said with eyes brightened. “Will you show me some of yours?”

“Some of my…?”

“Your songs Lance! If I’m going to put myself out there like that then I expect you to do the same.”

Lance paused to think for a second. He thought about what it would feel like to show Keith and the rest more of his songs. They were all so personal, Lance didn’t think he wanted to do that, nor did he think anyone else had any genuine interest. It would be like putting a piece of his heart out in the tundra and not expect it to freeze over.

“No.”

“What d’you mean no? If I showed you mine you have to—”

“You didn’t show me yours. I just happened to walk into you using my guitar and my lyrics to do—”

“You said you liked it.” Keith looked hurt. 

“I did.”

Keith frowned. “I don’t get why you’re being so—ugh! Why are you like this?”

“Like what Keith?” Lance McClain crossed his arms. 

“Like that! It’s always push and pull with you. One minute I think we’re getting along and the next you don’t want to have anything to do with me.”

“Why can’t we get along?” Keith had a stern look, eyes a deep violet now. He took a deep breath as if he hadn’t noticed his trembling fists at his sides. He gave himself a second and looked away from Lance. The light from the fireplace was burning dimly now, soft touches of orange and red.

“I think I’ll just leave. Pidge and Hunk invited us to play some game with wizards at her house.” Keith said. 

Lance turned so he couldn’t see his face. He had a million excuses in his head, _it's so late, might as well stay the night_ , but his voice was shaking when he said, throaty, “Fine.”

(Lance wondered, just for a slight second, if the reason he antagonized Keith was because of the way he made him stutter and make his stomach swoop but he quickly dismissed the thought as nonsense.)

Lance was walking Keith out, opening the door for him, thinking, _don't go, don't go._

And then:

“Or you could sing and prove me wrong." Keith was suddenly standing in front as they stared into each other's eyes, a summer sky against a hurricane. "Show me what Lance McClain is made of."

Lance sighed. 

“Or are you too scared?” Keith asked stubbornly, standing at Lance's door as if waiting for him to take his hand and follow him, wherever it was that Keith was so in a rush to reach. (Lance imagined that, holding a boy’s hand.) No, Keith Kogane was a lot of things but he was not a boy. He was a creature unto himself. Storm and shadow and fire.

Lance gulped at the power of Keith's glare.

♪

> _“_ **_Keith Kogane:_ ** ‘The first time I heard Lance sing?; [ _Pause_.] 'I don’t even think I really remember that. Lance was always singing _something_ . He was always…going through life to a made-up tune. I can tell you about the first time I heard Lance _really_ sing. I remember that like it is happening now. The song we wrote that night even ended up being a little romp on the record. We called it Baby Bird.'
> 
> 'He sang with so much emotion, I didn’t really appreciate at the time—just how much feeling Lance McClain could inject into his music. That was always something I struggled with. I was…’ [ _Pause._ ] ‘…y’know…afraid of feeling, of really feeling the music. And for a long time that…that held me back. But never Lance.’ [ _Laughs_.] ‘Never Lance.’”

—transcript from _‘De-Formed Voltron!_ ’ originally aired on VH1 in 2007

♪

Lance was used to singing around his house, thought it might ease the mood if he tried to agree with Keith for once instead of instigating him, didn't really think anything of it. Had no actual idea of how good his singing was. The pettier part wanted to prove to himself that he _could_ sing and play at the same time. (His mom said he sang like a nightingale, but she was his mom, she _had_ to say that.)

He thought about that for a second and then, “I can sing but I can never come up with a tune.”

“Just sing what I was singing,” Keith said, eyes fixed on Lance in a way that made his fingertips tingle.

“What? Right now?”

Keith nodded, eerily expectant. 

Lance hesitated. “Anything?”

Keith nodded. “Anything.”

Lance cleared his throat. His hands were shaking. The first few instrumental notes sang out into the silence as he plucked long fingers on steel strings. He couldn’t quite match the level of dexterity that Keith had been showing but at least he had been able to figure out the technique Keith had been using and replicate it. 

And then Lance was singing. Sudden as a bell in the night, clear and deep, sung true as an arrow, “ _Baby Bird, oh Baby Bird_ ” Lance risked a glance at Keith. He felt something glowing inside him when he turned and Keith was paying him his undivided attention.

Here Lance paused to think his next words. 

_I whistle a tune_

_And the tune is alike_

Lance took in a breath of air and for whatever reason, his eyes went from the delicate curve of Keith’s jawline to the way the twilight, coming through the narrow, wide window of the basement, lit his face in soft angles.

_To the tune of your_

_Heart-oh baby Baby Bird_

_Oh Baby Bird o’mine_

(Lance suddenly felt a longing to reach his hand forward, slide his hands through Keith’s hair; hold his hand. To kiss the sweet corner of his lips. Lance pushed the thoughts away and felt like crying.) Softly he continues through the song,

_Oh baby Baby Bird_

_Won’t you leave the birds behind_

And Keith is looking at him, really _looking_. And Lance feels _seen_ for the first time in his life. 

_And become lavender_

_Are you mine? Baby Bird o’mine,_

_Violent lover of mine..._

Lance sang, trying to look anywhere but at Keith. For some reason, his eyes kept taking him there. He gulped as he finished the final stanzas, When Lance did finish, out of breath, fingers slightly achy from plucking, hands shaking, he expected the worst, he expected to be cruelly criticized. 

“Dude,” Keith faux-whispered reverently. “ _Dude_.

And then no one spoke until, in a surprising turn of no events whatsoever, Keith stood up, walked to stand in front of Lance, and said, “See. We don’t need another singer. You”—Keith crouched before Lance and took his neck in his hands; Lance could feel Keith’s thumbs in the divots of his jaw—“are everything we need.” Lance felt his ears grow hot. And his neck. And his everything.

“You idiot,” Lance said. Keith pinched his cheeks so he would look like a fish. Through pinched cheeks, Lance continued, “That was supposed to make you _not_ want me to sing.” 

“You played yourself, McClain. Because you are _it._ ” (And god, if hearing Keith Kogane call him by his last name, didn’t do things to him he was very candidly ignoring this very moment!)

“Why didn’t you say you could sing?” Keith asked in the same reverent tone he had before. 

Keith let go of Lance’s face. 

"You've heard me sing!" 

"Not like that!" 

"Like what?" Lance asked 

“Lance.” And it wasn’t the first time Keith said his name but it was the first time he said it like _that._ Like he was someone important. "You are prodigious." 

Lance did not trust the squeezing feeling he got when he looked too much at Keith. And for that, he had only to blame Keith. He was the one lying to him, saying he was good at singing. He just wanted to humiliate him when it came down to it. 

Even so, Lance could not control the treacherous burst of pride in his chest.

♪

We arrive, at last, to the fourth slight. 

♪

It was later, twilight _—_ or morning _—_ however the reader chooses to view the hour of 5:43 AM _—_ and Keith said, after working on the song with Lance for almost six hours straight, "I'm tired. Let's do something else." 

"Sleep maybe?" 

"No not that," Keith said. 

It began with:

“Wanna come over to my house,” Keith had asked, glistening eyes betraying his nerves, still seeming glazed from the beers they had hours ago. 

Later, feeling they had drunk more than they should have, accepted the offer. Later in the day, after they had listened to more than just each other's music and kissed two times, Keith, unwittingly and without forethought of malice, not for the last time but for the first, broke Lance McClain’s heart.

The middle part:

Keith left as he had arrived, riding behind Lance. Lance tried very hard to concentrate with Keith gripping his jacket every time they made a turn. (At first Lance had thought Keith was afraid but then he seemed to realize it was Keith’s way of egging him on. 

“Sing for me Johnnyboy,” Keith said, half-joking.

Lance seemed about to protest but at the last second obliged and began singing a song in [Spanish](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M65EbAcrMds). He pedaled and sang, pedaled and sang, either doing one or the other, making their trip much slower than it needed to be. 

Keith closed his eyes focused on these five things: the sound of _Lance’s voice_ as he sang in a loud, crooning Spanish, the feeling of the cool twilit air in his hair, the sun a thin sliver atop the Atlea suburbs, an outline in orange, the _rough canvas_ of Lance’s stupid army jacket as he held on tight, and the _clean smell_ of Lance’s cologne as he rode them both home.

He didn't realize this but he was humming along to Lance's singing. 

They made it to Keith’s house when the sun was barely a line rising in the horizon, everything around them tinged in the familiar blue-green of twilight. 

This is how it happened:

They were sitting in the shed, surrounded by the New Mexico desert and records. It was 6:15 AM, so, naturally, they kept at their game of playing whatever they happened to pull out of the shelves.

Then as the sun became the size of a small coin Lance began to sing. Then Keith pulled out his guitar and, in a duet of sorts, began to accompany Lance's singing. 

Lance made a little prompting hand movement. “Whenever you’re ready.”

He was rewarded with a soft smile as Keith began plucking a few strings in a surprisingly folksy tune. Lance tried not to stare but Keith paid him no mind, already lost, fingers graceful along the guitar.

Without really knowing what he was doing, Lance reached for his own guitar, stretching across the floor, finger tugging the case toward him.

When Keith noticed Lance’s intentions, he paused.

Lance felt his pulse in his wrists as he tried to keep his hands from shaking.

“Wait,” Keith said. Walked over to the corner, where a sleek guitar case Lance hadn’t noticed stood. Keith opened it and took a black electric guitar with an ivory neck. He handed Lance his own cherry red guitar. Lance took it between hesitant fingers as Keith began messing with their amp settings.

Like gravity, suddenly Lance found himself in Keith’s space.

Keith experimentally plucked some notes, making some pinching motion to make the sound whiny. “I’ve been playing around with this.” Keith proceeded to play something Lance remembered from one of his music lessons. Keith was racing his fingers along the neck and the fingers of his right hand danced around the strings as if tickling them. 

The end result was something that sounded like a mix between British rock and blues. Lance had only played electric a couple of times, mostly when he had been checking out guitars at the music store a few towns away, but even he knew that was not regular playing. 

Not one to avoid a challenge, Lance did his best at an imitation of what Keith had done, adding some flourish of his own with some colorful strumming. “Kind of like that right?”

“Yeah, and then the accompanying guitar is sort of like—” Keith strummed a simple set of four chords, the strumming going down up down, down up down, in quick succession.

Keith nodded and ‘hmm’ed as his fingers played the lead.

Out of the corner of his eye, Lance couldn’t help but stare at Keith’s elegant profile as he bent over his guitar, plucking at strings in perfect sync with Lance’s playing. Lance admitted only slightly begrudgingly, that Keith was probably a genius, natural born talent.

Keith hummed the lyrics softly under his breath. Lance had never heard this song before. He didn’t think _anyone_ had ever heard this song before.

Keith stopped playing.

“Uh, so yeah. So that’s sort of—” Keith didn’t meet his eyes, suddenly shy.

Lance blinked, chasing away the daze. Missing—whatever closeness he had just had with Keith. His mouth felt dry, tongue like sandpaper and as he spoke, his voice came out breathy. “Yeah, I—uh, it’s—I like it.” Slowly, like two magnets pulling each other they drifted to the center of the room, both sitting on the couch overlooking the horizon.

♪

It felt like hours but it was only minutes later. They were standing in the middle of the room, watching the light rise across Altea, New Mexico.

Keith’s house was in a newer suburb made of inexpensive two-room houses so that meant the window of his shed looked out into the entirety of the sunrise, undisrupted by other houses. Just plains and mesquites for miles. They were sharing a bottle of Adam’s steak wine and laughing about nothing when Lance looked deep into Keith's eyes. Looking back Lance thinks it was as if he was asking for permission for what he was about to do. Like a secret code, a secret look. 

Leaning in, he clumsily slotted their lips together. He smiled as he kissed the corner of Keith’s smile—for Keith had been smiling, _laughing_.

Keith kissed him back, just for a second, the soft push of his lips against Lance’s. And then Keith giggled, said, “What are we doing?” 

Lance froze and thought to himself exactly that. _What was he doing? He was kissing a boy, did that mean_ — _what did that mean? Did he like it?_ After Keith tentatively swept his tongue across Lance’s bottom lip Lance decided that, _yes,_ he very much liked it. His body reacted on its own, pressing as close to Keith as was physically possible. 

They ended in an awkward position where Keith was pushed onto the couch, half-leaning into the arm of it, as Lance climbed into his lap and kissed him dizzy. He stripped Keith's ugly flannel off only to find a faded t-shirt from the Altea Fire Department. He laughed, said, "Why are you wearing that shirt?"

And then, still drunk on drugs and other things, Lance collapsed on top of Keith and pinned him down, resting his chin along Keith’s chest. Keith, who was already almost asleep, tangled his arms around Lance like a koala and kissed his temple one last time. 

♪

Lance woke up alone. He didn't remember falling asleep, he just remembered the soft brush of Keith's lips against his hair. 

Lance had gone over it all night long. Looked at it analytically. And it all came back to one thing. One tiny thing. (Lance was not ready to talk about.the thing but he was at least ready to acknowledge he had kissed another boy. And liked it.) 

Lance was eating breakfast (if eating at noon counted as breakfast) when Hunk came over, hungover and sat in Keith’s kitchen while Lance ate Keith’s cereal and used Keith’s bowl and drank Keith’s juice. Hunk caught Lance's eye, concern clear in his eyes. 

"Have you seen Keith by any chance?" Lance asked mid-chew. Hunk had made himself at home and was cooking chocolate chip pancakes.

“You're still fighting with Keith?" He poured the batter on to a sizzling pan with butter. 

Lance just gave him a pitiful shrug, feeling heavy. "I don't think so," Lance admitted without admitting to any further fraternization. 

"I think he's over at Pidge's. Got a call from his brother." 

Was this what a hangover was. His head was throbbing. When they were done eating Hunk asked, “Why do you hate him so much anyway?”

The sun felt too bright. And Lance wasn’t sure he did hate him. Not with how he still felt the ghost of his lips on his own. 

Hunk sighed, and when he was sure he wouldn’t get an answer he said, “Did you know his brother's in Vietnam?"

Lance didn’t. For some reason, he had pictured Keith having one of those families where the parents are divorced and that was why Keith lived with his brother and Adam.

 _“Oh_.” Lance shifted uncomfortably.

“Yeah, dude. He and Pidge are kind of childhood friends. They knew each other from before Keith’s dad died—Pidge's brother was also drafted but got excused. Or at least that's what Pidge says. She says Keith's brother enlisted on his own when he was our age.”

Lance thought about how Keith never talked about his parents and his lips settling into a grim line. “Does Keith not have parents?”

It felt like an uncountable amount of time later when Hunk just said, “No.”

Later, Lance thought back at the image of Keith, his skinny shoulders, slumped over as he tuned his guitar. Lance thought—absently, in the corners of his mind—that Keith had looked nice like that, eyes bright as he played Lance a song he had never played anyone else before. As he kissed him back, lips swollen. 

The thought of seeing Keith again excited him. He felt extra sharp, ready for whatever it was that came after. Scared but ready if it meant having Keith and doing what they did last night for the foreseeable future.

♪

And here how it ends: _Keith Kogane thought he was doing him a favor._

Keith Kogane woke up. Nestled Lance McClain into the couch, placed a pillow under his head, a blanket over his frame, and went to sleep in his own room. 

And all through the time Lance slept on the squishy sofa with a pillow that smelled like Keith’s shampoo, Keith did not sleep a wink, thinking only of the feel of Lance's lips on his own, on the way he tilted his chin to capture Keith's lips fully, the tentative little suck he gave Lance’s bottom lip. Keoth felt a novel pull in his navel and some part of him moved his hand to rest atop his hardening dick. Keith tried to think of Lance like an object, to see if then he would have a different reaction. 

But instead, he thought of the softness of Lance's lips, the stubble on the side of the lip Lance had kissed with clumsy, drunk lips. Keith thought of how much he had liked it. Keith thought of how much he had liked and how much more he wanted. From Lance. And hadn’t realized until now. 

The favor Keith thought he was doing was simple. It was made out of self-preservation and fear _—_ and also of the fact that Lance was very much _not_ queer _._ Or at least not through any way that did not involve _evil spirits,_ like vodka or... Budweiser. So Keith dismissed it as a moment of experimentation in Lance's life rather than any real indication of attraction.

And when they all awoke and ate and played around in Keith’s shed and Keith’s room and Keith’s backyard, Keith ignored Lance. The favor Keith did him was forgetting about the kiss entirely. 

Lance McClain woke up on October 23rd with the reminder of a kiss Keith Kogane denies to this day. And also, Lance McClain might be in love with him. 

♪

> “...Voltron was one of the greatest and most influential bands to come out of the ’70s. The band, playing since they were seniors in high school, weren’t all they were cut out to be. Vocalist Allura was rumored to have been in an unstable relationship with vocalist Lance McClain that went on for years until he admitted to cheating on her in his memoir _Clean_.
> 
> As if that weren’t enough, there were also the legendary feuds between McClain and fellow bandmate Keith Kogane. Throughout their career the two would go through periods of turmoil which were chronicled in the band’s music and lyrics, producing some of the most innovative records of the decade.
> 
> However, it was the alleged love triangle between female vocalist Allura and her bandmates McClain and Kogane that ended up being the band's demise in ‘76. Following the band’s 1976 _Listeners_ tour in which Kogane famously left the band after their final show.
> 
> ‘I was just in a really bad place at the time,’ Kogane admitted in an interview years later. When questioned about his relationship with bandmate Allura he refused to comment.
> 
> Following the band’s initial split after _Listeners,_ the groups lead vocalist, McClain, wrote and produced _the Storms,_ a solo album which did not include any work between lead guitarist and one fellow collaborator, Kogane. The album was panned by critics but reached #2 in the US and #14 in the UK...
> 
> ...In 1993 Kogane came out as gay dissolving the long-held rumours about the feud between him and McClain being due to fellow vocalist Allura. To this day it remains a mystery why the relationship between Kogane and McClain was once so turbulent...” 

_—_ excerpt from Rolling Stone’s ‘ _In the Stars in the 70’s and Now’,_ May 1997 Special Edition Issue, Author _Candace Seleyandia_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and kudos are like writer currency! If you like this fic leave me a comment and let me know what you liked, I'll hoard it like treasure!

**Author's Note:**

> Whoof has this fic been a rough battle. I started writing it BEFORE season 8. I finally decided I would post it before the fandom goes extinct lol. My perfectionism makes it hard to let it go but eventually, eyeballs other than my own have to (hopefully) read these words.
> 
> This is gonna be a long one guys so strap yourselves down lol luckily I already have about half of it written. It was inspired by the events surrounding the band Fleetwood Mac and their making of Rumours as well as my lifelong dream of seeing my favorite bands get back together (Cough, PATD). If you are into books you might find some similarities between the premise for this fic and the book Daisy Jones and the Six. I was already writing the fic long before the book came out but once it came out I DID read it (and loved it) so there are influences of it within the fic.


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